2 ms·
A cool question, but you don’t need to have direct knowledge to see the answer. Economies of scale make bigger things more efficient. But that’s just the rocke
by speedplane 8y ago
A cool question, but you don’t need to have direct knowledge to see the answer. Economies of scale make bigger things more efficient.
But that’s just the rocket. I suspect the thousands of people working on it have a far larger environmental impact than the rocket itself.
- fastball 8y agoI thought that maybe there could be something particular to how rockets work which would cause economies-of-scale to be irrelevant in the case of rockets, and so a bigger rocket wouldn't necessarily deliver a payload more efficiently (per kilogram). Besides that though, I was also thinking about the ultimate goal of these companies. Presumably, both SpaceX and Rocket Labs (and others) want launching rockets to become a much more common day-to-day activity than it is now. At that point, would it not be better for us to focus on bigger rockets to ensure that we're not creating unnecessary pollution with smaller rockets? Kinda the difference we could've made if the US for example had focused on large-scale public transit rather than urban sprawls where everyone has their own car. If we have the option now, it seems to be like we should push for the large-scale more efficient solutions now so that it doesn't come back to bite us later.