It is barely within our technical capabilities to build 30-meter-class telescopes on Earth. Such telescopes cost on the order of $1 billion each. The cost to b

It is barely within our technical capabilities to build 30-meter-class telescopes on Earth. Such telescopes cost on the order of $1 billion each. The cost to build JWST, a 6.5-meter space telescope, is over $10 billion. The ground-based telescope costs 1/10th as much and has 20x the collecting area (and 4.5x the resolution). Unlike the space telescope, the ground-based telescope can be periodically upgraded with new cameras, spectrometers, and other scientific instruments. Space telescopes have a place in astronomy, but they're no substitute for ground-based telescopes.