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>There has been a lot of buzz recently about spaceflight companies shooting for frequent "airline-like operations," but scientists, engineers and policy makers

>There has been a lot of buzz recently about spaceflight companies shooting for frequent "airline-like operations," but scientists, engineers and policy makers generally are not "putting two and two together with respect to the emissions that are implied by that idea," I wouldn't worry about that. I saw Musk's video[1] on using rockets as a way to supplant air-travel and the idea is even more ridiculous than his hyperloop and underground-moving-street concepts. There's no point in mentioning it as even a possible eventuality. Rockets will never be used for intra-earth passenger travel. [1]https://www.space.com/38314-elon-musk-spacex-mars-rocket-earth-travel.html https://www.space.com/38314-elon-musk-spacex-mars-rocket-ear...

CapitalistCartr 7y ago
I think just the opposite. Once rocketry is cheaper, not throwing the craft away with each flight, it makes perfect sense for inter-continental flights. Have a space plane for each city fly to an orbiting transfer station; passengers switch planes and arrive anywhere in the World in three hours or less.
- mattlondon 7y ago
  I believe the plan from SpaceX is for point to point ballistic travel in a rocket carrying ~100 people, not going via something in orbit. Flight times of an hour from anywhere on the planet to anywhere IIRC
  - manderley 7y ago
    Considering something like the Concorde wasn't even possible to operate at a profit, I'm very skeptical.
    - Retric 7y ago
      Concord had a very limited number of viable routes which prevented the program from breaking even with the R&D costs. However, the aircraft was operated profitably later on after significant tick price increases. A 1 hour US to Asia route that charged 50k a seat could likely be viable. That’s ultra first class, but finding ~100 passengers each way per day should be easy. It’s only expanding to more routes that would be problematic. PS: The fuel costs would actually be comparable to a regular flight. It’s mostly a question of how many trips the rocket could make and how many passengers it could carry.
  - sitkack 7y ago
    ICBMM (inter continental ballistic meat missiles)
- gbrown 7y ago
  Not a chance - the Delta-v required to get to orbital velocity absolutely dwarfs that needed for suborbital hops, and your scheme also adds delays and tons of complexity. If rocket travel ever becomes a thing, it will involve suborbital hops.
- rsynnott 7y ago
  The fuel requirements for this would be absurdly high. Note that even supersonic travel died out, largely because the economics didn’t work.
- macspoofing 7y ago
  Oh Come one. What problem does rocketry solve? Right off the bat, it's horrendously expensive and it's dangerous and it's always going to be dangerous. Plus comfort ... do you think it's comfortable for passengers to be subjected to multiple G forces on launch and re-entry? Plus we will never be able to scale rocketry to the thousands of flights per day that are occuring today (with an unbelievable safety record). >Passengers switch planes and arrive anywhere in the World in three hours or less. You're never going to get that. EVER. International airports today tend to be situated far from urban centers because of noise concerns, safety, and cost. These issues are magnified with rockets. Launchpads would have to be placed even further out and pre-boarding checks would take forever. For God's sake, the Concord wasn't allowed to go supersonic until it was over open ocean. You think tens or hundreds of rocket launches per day will EVER be allowed to be anywhere near any urban center? This is such a naive view. Rockets will never be good for passenger travel.

CapitalistCartr 7y ago

I think just the opposite. Once rocketry is cheaper, not throwing the craft away with each flight, it makes perfect sense for inter-continental flights. Have a space plane for each city fly to an orbiting transfer station; passengers switch planes and arrive anywhere in the World in three hours or less.

mattlondon 7y ago
I believe the plan from SpaceX is for point to point ballistic travel in a rocket carrying ~100 people, not going via something in orbit. Flight times of an hour from anywhere on the planet to anywhere IIRC
- manderley 7y ago
  Considering something like the Concorde wasn't even possible to operate at a profit, I'm very skeptical.
  - Retric 7y ago
    Concord had a very limited number of viable routes which prevented the program from breaking even with the R&D costs. However, the aircraft was operated profitably later on after significant tick price increases. A 1 hour US to Asia route that charged 50k a seat could likely be viable. That’s ultra first class, but finding ~100 passengers each way per day should be easy. It’s only expanding to more routes that would be problematic. PS: The fuel costs would actually be comparable to a regular flight. It’s mostly a question of how many trips the rocket could make and how many passengers it could carry.
- sitkack 7y ago
  ICBMM (inter continental ballistic meat missiles)
gbrown 7y ago
Not a chance - the Delta-v required to get to orbital velocity absolutely dwarfs that needed for suborbital hops, and your scheme also adds delays and tons of complexity. If rocket travel ever becomes a thing, it will involve suborbital hops.
rsynnott 7y ago
The fuel requirements for this would be absurdly high. Note that even supersonic travel died out, largely because the economics didn’t work.
macspoofing 7y ago
Oh Come one. What problem does rocketry solve? Right off the bat, it's horrendously expensive and it's dangerous and it's always going to be dangerous. Plus comfort ... do you think it's comfortable for passengers to be subjected to multiple G forces on launch and re-entry? Plus we will never be able to scale rocketry to the thousands of flights per day that are occuring today (with an unbelievable safety record). >Passengers switch planes and arrive anywhere in the World in three hours or less. You're never going to get that. EVER. International airports today tend to be situated far from urban centers because of noise concerns, safety, and cost. These issues are magnified with rockets. Launchpads would have to be placed even further out and pre-boarding checks would take forever. For God's sake, the Concord wasn't allowed to go supersonic until it was over open ocean. You think tens or hundreds of rocket launches per day will EVER be allowed to be anywhere near any urban center? This is such a naive view. Rockets will never be good for passenger travel.