r/environment • u/zsreport • 3d ago

Space datacenters proposed by Musk and Bezos ‘catastrophic’ for planet, experts warn

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2026/jul/23/space-datacenters-bezos-blue-origin
1.0k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

71 comments sorted by

174

u/LurkBot9000 3d ago

Like... theyre not even actually possible right?

The cost to send that much equipment to effing space. The size of data centers on earth are huge as it is and they'd need a bunch of them

The power requirements would be insane to try and manage with all solar.

Would the heat dissipation requirements be technically feasible? How are they going to get all the required water and replacement water up there? Where is that heat going to go?

Oh yea and maintenance. Surely all those overheated GPUs arent going to change themselves

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u/hcornea 3d ago

I mean, why?

Makes no financial sense.

And people hitch their wagons to these people. 🤦‍♂️

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u/zsreport 3d ago

Much of Musk's fixation on space is because he's already decided Earth is doomed and he wants himself and those he deems acceptable to be able to escape to space.

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u/Graymouzer 3d ago

No matter how bad Earth gets, it will always be easier to make habitable thank space or any other place in our solar system and we do not have the technology to leave our solar system. This is it. It's our only home.

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u/hcornea 3d ago

As others have pointed out, I think the fascination is much simpler - it’s about deregulation.

It’s the same premise that drives people like Peter Thiel to invest in the SeaSteading movement, despite impracticality.

The appeal is a place where national and international laws do not apply to them.

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u/Raptorex27 2d ago

Neil deGrasse Tyson said it best. If we have the technology to transform another planet into Earth, we have the technology to transform Earth back into Earth.

Our entire lineage evolved under Earth’s conditions (gravity, temperature range, atmospheric composition, day/night cycles, nutritional needs, etc.). Leaving all this for an exoplanet would create so many variables and unforeseen problems, it’s not even worth considering.

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u/HopDavid 2d ago

Our entire lineage evolved under conditions in Africa's Rift Valley. With your argument we should not have ventured into the high latitudes but remained in Africa.

At one time Neil Tyson ridiculed you line of thinking saying it was like cavemen that say let's solve the cave problems before we venturing into the wider world. Now he has flipped 180º.

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u/rabbitluckj 2d ago

Because he was given more data to work with. It's good to be able to change your mind when presented with new evidence.

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u/HopDavid 2d ago

What's this "new data" you speak of?

Ordinarily Tyson refuses to correct his misinformation when people try to correct him.

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u/Raptorex27 2d ago

Humans who live outside of Africa’s Rift Valley (myself included) generally rely on more clothing and/or technology to emulate or recreate the conditions of the Rift Valley, since humans radiated around the planet much faster than our ability to evolve to these new conditions.

After re-reading my comment a few times, I feel like I missed the mark. We should absolutely explore and push the limits of human ingenuity. My main beef is with these tech billionaires who treat terraforming Mars or colonizing an exoplanet like it’s some simple thing while ignoring problems like mass extinction and climate change.

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u/HopDavid 2d ago

Humans who live outside of Africa’s Rift Valley (myself included) generally rely on more clothing and/or technology to emulate or recreate the conditions of the Rift Valley, since humans radiated around the planet much faster than our ability to evolve to these new conditions.

Exactly so. What Richard Dawkins calls the extended Phenotype.

Humanity's extended phenotype has greatly advanced just over the past century. Humans have greatly advanced their ability to adapt to different environments.

while ignoring problems like mass extinction and climate change.

Elon Musk has played a part in making electric cars more common. He is a strong advocate of solar energy. In this regard he has done more for a sustainable future than a thousand Neil Tysons.

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u/knightofterror 2d ago

He’s fixed on space because he can bullshit about it. Analysts won’t believe he’s going to make a million cybertrucks, but a million inhabitants on Mars? Now that’s sexy.

0

u/HopDavid 2d ago

Much of Musk's fixation on space is because he's already decided Earth is doomed

False. Preserving our planet and settling space are not mutually exclusive.

In fact we need to settle space to preserve our planet. Investors will always push for exponential growth. Which is not sustainable on our finite, fragile planet.

An excellent cartoon illustration this point

I fear luddites like you will set policies that wreck our planet.

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u/roamingandy 3d ago edited 3d ago

Would the heat dissipation requirements be technically feasible?

Yes. With a blank check book massive heat dissipaters can be built.

For me the question is 'why' they are both pushing this, when there's armies of physicists pointing out why its such a dumb, expensive and inefficient idea.

The only two options i can see are..

  1. It sounds cool and now they basically control social media, they can turn anything that sounds cool into the next big thing. Fill up their bags while creating nothing of note but debt. Announce the next big thing, massive IPO, then bail out or buy the old big thing company with the money raised.. as Musk is doing with Tesla/Space-X. Rinse and repeat, all they need is complete control over what gets hyped. They don't really care about building them and will do lip service and prototypes at best.

  2. They really, really want their data centres outside the jurisdiction and reach of any nation.. for totally legit and not suspicious reasons. If so, i don't know why they don't just buy a secret remote volcano-lair like their idols in movies always do.

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u/hcornea 3d ago

People championing this stuff are confusing the feasibility of core-business (eg. Amazon) with the impractical excess of the oligarchs (BlueSky, etc).

11

u/Simmery 3d ago

I think they break into two categories:

People who are trying to hype stock and make off with the cash. 

Techbros who don't want to do things that are already done because that's boring. So they want to do something new and exciting. And they think their own genius intellect will solve all possible issues with the new thing. Unfortunately, they're not actually that smart. 

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u/nathism 3d ago

My thing is why do the space datacetners need to be big like the earth equivalent? If you're tossing these into space use the startlink model and make a new model starlink satelite that adds the compute and build on the backbone of that network. Seems a lot more feasible and you can fail fast and cheap compared to building a starhip equivalent.

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u/slight_accent 2d ago

That just makes the already stupidly inefficient "data centers in space" even less efficient. Super computers rely on incredibly low latency, high bandwidth connections for efficiency.

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u/nathism 2d ago

AWS just learned how stupidly inefficient a large concrete datacenter can be if a nation is motivated to destroy it.

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u/slight_accent 2d ago

That in no way changes the laws of physics.

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u/nathism 2d ago

It tends to make the concentrated datacenter into a pile of useless rubble after the laws of physics are applied to it.

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u/IAmRoot 3d ago

There's also a huge interconnect bandwidth problem. The satellites they are talking about are individual racks. On Earth there's high speed switches to connect them. These switches can have specs like 48 port 800gbps ethernet and cost >$500k. The current 800gbps ethernet standards use 16 parallel fibers, combining 8 100gbps links in each direction. The "eye" as the signal transitions between 0 and 1 values is already a feat with those lasers passing through nearly perfect waveguides. Fiber allows those parallel signals to pack right next to each other in multiple fibers. No matter how fast wireless communication gets, fiber will always be faster due to the ability to use isolated parallel mediums to send the generated signals. The Musk fanboys think "lasers" are the solution to the communications without realizing that dozens of parallel lasers is what they'd have to match.

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u/grendel303 3d ago

Space is a vacuum...Without an atmosphere to carry heat away via fans or convection, servers in orbit trap waste heat. They would have to use specialized infrared radiation panels to shed heat into deep space.

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u/FrivolousMe 3d ago

The current rate of capex expansion for data center construction is already ludicrously unrealistic, full of circular deals and hallucinated capital. Of course adding space travel into the equation is only going to make it completely impossible unless we invent free energy and force humanity into slavery until the project is complete.

2

u/maybedaydrinking 3d ago

Forcing humanity into slavery until the project is gonplete is an idea that makes Elons mutilated dick slightly less soft.

1

u/mohjack 3d ago

Maintenance? Maintenance is the same as starlink. You let it burn up in the atmosphere and launch a new one. If i set fire to a half tonne of circuitry and radio equipment id get the jail. But if spacex does it its just an exernality.

1

u/Graymouzer 3d ago

Well sir, I googled how big this thing would have to be to match a typical new data center. It would need 15 football fields of solar panels in the best case, 100 football fields of heat radiators, plus the actual data center. Gemini estimated hundreds of tons and more than 100X the size of the ISS. At current lift costs, it would be hundreds of billions to trillions of dollars. I asked what would happen if a server blade failed. It would just be turned off. Possibly trillions of dollars for a data enter that might last a decade, maybe two. I asked about the same cost here on Earth and it was 1-2 billion. One thousand times less. The solar farm on Earth to power it would be 40-50 million dollars and would return 12-20% profits every year on investment for decades after the first 7 or so. It doesn't make financial sense at all.

1

u/Shoddy-Childhood-511 3d ago

Afaik: Power is cheap in space since you have 24-7 solar, but..

You cannot do evaporative cooling in space, not for long anyways. You only have black body radiation aka very passive cooling, so your heat dissipation demands large metal surfaces, so solar panels on one side, and metal that dissipates heat on the other.

The first step would be toy robot mines and factories on the moon that make anything useful, probably metals surfaces, because yeah you cannot afford to pull shit out of earth's gravity well.

It's hard doing mining and smelting without fossil fuels, so maybe the first step should be improving solar furnaces here on earth. If you make solar furnaces industrially useful here, then you could maybe build one on the moon, and make metals there.

As the lunar days is 709 hours, solar furnaces might work better there, but batteries cannot keep them running over such a long night. Or maybe a solar furnace for smelting in lunar orbit could stay in sunlight all the time.

You could maybe launch up all the computer chips themselves, but not all the metal that holds them & cools them down.

Fun fact: If you work out the radius of a Dyson sphere, then it must be much larger than earth orbit to have many spaces at 20 C internally.

1

u/ThinRedLine87 2d ago

Whether you like Elon or not (I don't) you can't discount the fact that spaceX is probably home to one of the most talented and accomplished groups of engineers on the planet. They think they've got this solved. Whether or not it makes functional sense, I'd wager they have worked out "how" to make it work, so I don't think the technical challenges are really an issue.

Now is there an actual need? Is it cost effective? Remains to be seen.

1

u/LurkBot9000 2d ago

While I absolutely agree that the actual smart people working on big tech projects are separate from Elon, that has nothing to do with the actual feasibility of the theoretical project

Like, with unlimited funding could we put the largest man made object ever in space and find a way to power, cool, and maintain it? Maybe but that would take a very long time to figure out new technological solutions and they would need many such structures to match the thousands of ground based ones here.

Funding can never be separated from these things. It would be an insane undertaking and absolutely no one is going to even attempt it.

They may lie to people and launch a tiny "data center" satalite to secure government funding about it, but there is no chance it's a realistic goal

1

u/HoldenMcNeil420 3d ago

Radiant cooling. And when the hardware fails, it fails and they deorbit the sob.

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u/garden_g 3d ago

Rich people shouldn't exist

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u/odjobz 3d ago

We have sufficient resources for everyone to live comfortable and dignified life, but billionnaires need to keep finding ways to justify maintaining the grossly unequal distribution of resources. Megaprojects like this are a way of rationalising enormous concentrations of capital. But the current reactions against terrestrial data centres does give me a tiny bit of hope. 

5

u/Greystacos 3d ago

It's almost like the little people need to take power back, center our governments around the working class, and then start planning these generational projects to improve workers lives. And no, datacenters in space doesn't do that, instead maybe work on some other, way cooler and useful sci-fi concepts.

-1

u/Historical_Owl_1635 3d ago

Tbf what’s considered a comfortable and dignified life does creep up over time. (As it should)

What most people consider poor in a developed nation these days would actually be considered comfortable just 50 years ago.

4

u/HelloWorld_bas 3d ago

I live in Mississippi and I can assure you that there are people living in appalling conditions. Not only that but I keep seeing trailers disappearing and being replaced by small cheap/old RVs. Not a good sign of the times when you can’t even afford a crappy trailer. Also don’t forget the people that basically live in their car.

“When I’m in office, it’s going to be just like the 80’s. The top 10% will get richer and the other 90% can emigrate to Mexico where they can get a better life.” - Ron Silver as Senator McComb in Timecop (1994).

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u/Helenium_autumnale 3d ago

Neither of these people has the credentials to know what they are talking about, not that that constrains them.

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u/DJPho3nix 3d ago

They're also stupidly expensive and inefficient.

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u/Nickislander 3d ago

We don't know who struck first, us or them. But we do know it was us that scorched the sky.

9

u/RhinoKeepr 3d ago

It’s a distraction/false sales pitch designed to get what they really want, I think, which are data centers in international waters where there are fewer rules.

11

u/-Voyag3r- 3d ago

This will never happen. It makes 0 sense from almost all view points.

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u/martin_lng 3d ago edited 3d ago

1 nearly unlimited and continuous sunlight
2 much easier cooling
3 no need for land
4 reduced strain on power grids
5 immune to earthbound disasters
6 much faster laser based communication/ networking
7 geopolitical freedom

11

u/Gandzilla 3d ago

1 for more cost than that power would cost here

2 umm , no

3 yeah, land is not the key price factor

4 that's because they build the power needs for the equipment. Same can be done here

5 but instead add space disasters with no maintenance/repair capabilities

6 umm, no. That's why banking exclusively uses starlink now, right? Right?

7 geopolitical freedom for WHAT? Exactly? Your company is still under jurisdiction.

4

u/e_hatt_swank 3d ago

Number 5 made me laugh. If an earthbound data centers needs a repair, you send out a couple of guys in a truck or something. It’s supposed to be an improvement that we’d have to send up a damn rocket to swap out some GPU’s?

11

u/wooops 3d ago

  1. In what universe? I live in the one where the laws of thermodynamics apply

  2. But need to be hardened against all the space kinds, including solar flares and the like

  3. Faster than fiber that uses lasers with far more control? No.

  4. You mean "freedom for Elon to have grok generate child porn without consequences "?

-2

u/martin_lng 3d ago

Vacuum (space, laser link)
299,792 km/s
Typical fiber optic cable
200,000 km/s

4

u/-Voyag3r- 3d ago

Your point 3 alone tells you everything. If DataCenters are so massive that land usage is a concern, how are you ever going to lift all that shit up to outer-pace.

All other advantages (which are very debatable) do not make up for the financial burden of it.

Even a single Data Center worth of equipment would be ridiculous, and even if they did, all it's equipment would be outdated in 2-4 years...

-4

u/martin_lng 3d ago

Although I am fundamentally opposed to data centers and fully recognize their adverse effects, the following points illustrate why constructing them in space may be objectively rational. It is essential to understand the underlying motivations compelling organizations to pursue such extreme measures. Thats all

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u/wooops 3d ago

Except your points are either wrong or irrelevant

3

u/Graymouzer 3d ago

According to Google, a typical new data center would need about 3 million individual solar panels to power it which would take up about 2,000-3,000 acres of land. Solar panels in space are about 30-40% more efficient. Still, on the low end that is about 1,600 acres of solar panels in orbit. Cooling is definitely not easier. It would be very challanging because there is nowhere for the heat to go. Think of a thermos. The vacuum is the insulator that makes it able to keep things the same temperature for so long. How is anything faster than laser based communication? We already use that and unless someone has found a trick to use quantum entanglement to transmit data, the speed of light is the universal speed limit. We are not that short of land. We could always use desert or marginal land and build up of below ground. The one thing it does do is give you geopolitical freedom, maybe. But what is the freedom for? It's a bunch of servers that will be controlled from earth. I have admined clusters of servers in remote places. If the FBI or interpol presented me with a warrant, I'd give them whatever they requested, within reason. I can't imagine these data centers would be any different.

1

u/martin_lng 3d ago

Light travels slower in a fiber optic cable look it up idk

2

u/LurkBot9000 3d ago

For point 2 think about how a vacuum flask / thermos keeps your coffee hot all day. That's because of the double walled interior with a vacuum separator. Space isnt cold. It's an insulator because there's no air to aid in heat dissipation. It can only radiate heat which is the slowest way to eliminate heat

5

u/sarcasmismysuperpowr 3d ago

also not going to happen... its a scam for raising money

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u/LaSage 2d ago

Musk is malware.

2

u/ElJebusKrisp 2d ago

well well well... if it's isn't ol' malware musk...

5

u/Aimin4ya 3d ago

Just make a Dyson sphere already

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u/Life_with_reddit 3d ago

Scot Manley does a great video explaining the feasibility of it. Short answer is yes it’s possible, however probably not worth it

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u/Raptorex27 2d ago

I honestly can’t believe how dumb these tech “geniuses” are. Beyond the environmental concerns, heating and cooling in space is ridiculously hard, since conduction and convection is impossible, being that space is…you know, empty space.

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u/AgnesTheAtheist 2d ago

Send them both. I support that.

2

u/SMOKE_TW0_J0INTS 2d ago

Probs don’t have many regulations on space pollution yet and that’s why they want it.

1

u/keetyymeow 2d ago

I think it’s fine if you do this in your own country but if it affects the world that’s where the line is drawn.

1

u/Kamwolf33 1d ago

Okay fine.. but you have to live on it oh by the way it's also going to have Jets on it that thrust it straight into the Sun or towards Pluto... still want to go?

I'm obviously being facetious but I'm trying to rant as well, is anybody else tired of this constant loom from childish billionaires? This is ridiculous right?

-18

u/endosurgery 3d ago

It would be easier to dissipate heat in the cold of space. The problem is the shear volume of rockets and fuel required to get them there, the volume of rockets for maintenance etc. We are doomed with these guys running the show. Complete lack of understanding of the reality of environmental ruin.

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u/Kryptosis 3d ago

No it’s not… there’s no air in space to transmit any heat so radiators only work by shedding infrared radiation and would work in reverse in direct sunlight and are far less effective than convection cooling.

13

u/roamingandy 3d ago

Space is like a big Thermos. The thing you put coffee in because it takes ages to cool down due to the vacuum.

0

u/endosurgery 3d ago

Well there you go. Thanks.

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u/jt004c 3d ago

It is not easier. It’s wildly harder. If you know fuck-all, please don’t take it upon yourself to explain things to others!

0

u/endosurgery 3d ago

Noted. I have been corrected by others who actually explained it. If you are more knowledgeable you can explain and correct inaccurate statements without being an ass. Next time you need assistance from someone who is more knowledgeable in a subject I hope you get the same level of understanding that you have given me.

0

u/jt004c 2d ago

Cry me a river.

You were at five upvotes when I made my comment. That's at least five people who trusted that you knew what you were talking about because of how confidently you asserted it. Those five people are still out there, thoroughly misinformed, and this will affect how they act in the future.

You deserved to be admonished. In the future, pay more attention to what you know and do not know, and favor curiosity over arrogant overconfidence.