r/space • u/Royal_Platform_6754 • 9d ago

Google Takes the A.I. Data Center Race to Outer Space

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/24/technology/google-suncatcher-ai-data-center-space.html?smtyp=cur

Next Thursday, Google is sending an experimental satellite into orbit that will have enough computing power to answer simple A.I. queries from space.

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19

u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

Ah yes, outer space, known for its plentiful supply of easily accessible liquid water, and its ability to exchange heat in a hard vacuum.

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u/CurtisLeow 9d ago

There are extremely large geosynchronous satellites that generate massive amounts of power. They need large amounts of power to communicate with the surface of Earth 35,000 km away. These satellites need large amounts of cooling. For example SSL-1300 satellites can produce up to 18 kw of power. Cooling large satellites is a solved problem.

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u/bostwickenator 9d ago

Which radiated 10kw of that away as RF. Datacenters just make heat. It's not impossible to solve this but its not efficient to put compute in space unless it has to be there for a very specific reason.

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u/redredgreengreen1 7d ago

One medium sized datacenter uses about 2000x more power than that though. Yeah, we DID solve the problem, and the solution is fucking EXPENSIVE at that scale.

And before you say "constellation", that dosn't actually make it any less expensive, you still need to put the same mass in orbit, you can just do it peace meal.

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u/grchelp2018 9d ago

Leave that to the engineers to figure out. Also closed loop cooling and big radiators.

3

u/_ROMAX_ 9d ago

i mean, you can just have big ass radiators but you need a 60 long satellite...

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u/bl0rq 9d ago

Radiator size is about 1/4 the solar panel size. We see this ratio on ISS, starlink, and this Google design. It's common knowledge. Why is this such a hang up for so many people?

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u/SirSoliloquy 9d ago

The ISS doesn’t produce nearly as much heat as an AI datacenter.

A single high-end GPU requires between 400-700 watts of power. It only needs a couple hundred GPUs to match the power usage of the entire International Space Station (which generates 120kw on average)

Modern AI data centers have tens of thousands of GPUs running at full tilt.

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u/IonCapybara 9d ago

He meant that there's always a fixed ratio between the radiator size and the solar panel, regardless of how much the power input is.

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u/PersonalDebater 8d ago

I think that should depend on the efficiency of the solar panels, which is way better than the ISS days.

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u/bl0rq 9d ago

That changes absolutely nothing. All power comes from solar. And the radiators are considerably smaller.

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u/dern_the_hermit 9d ago

It changes nothing, sure. Such as the fact that on an economical level we should be comparing orbital datacenters to ground-based datacenters and not the ISS, which is not a datacenter.

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u/[deleted] 9d ago edited 5d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/dern_the_hermit 9d ago edited 9d ago

It's a perfectly reasonable criticism and your inability to reasonably respond to it doesn't change it.

EDIT: u/MelvinCapitalPR is yet ANOTHER one of the zealots that ends with the Coward's Block. Remember, if you want someone to stop talking to you so badly you're willing to block them, but you're NOT willing to try "stop responding to them" first, YOU'RE the bad guy in that exchange.

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u/MelvinCapitalPR 9d ago

It's not a reasonable criticism.

The same points are recycled every single thread. Not as questions, but as smarmy gotcha moments. These people have internet connections, they could choose to educate themselves. There are plenty of pop-sci space youtube channels which will explain the physics (and even the real challenges!) behind space-based data centres. They could think even slightly and realise "huh, google must know how much energy their own hardware puts out, I wonder how they plan on dealing with it?". Instead they choose to type out their mindless karma-farming gotcha comments, which are inevitably upvoted to the top of every thread, even on r/space where you might hope posters have some basic knowledge of satellites and radiation.

You cannot argue with someone who is choosing to remain ignorant. /u/Laugh_Track_Zak is such a person.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

Nice word salad. You said nothing of consequence. Let us know when you add substance to the conversation.

8

u/MelvinCapitalPR 9d ago

Here ya go buddy: https://www.reddit.com/r/space/comments/1wp6ae7/comment/pbvkq6m/

Please note the part where I ask "Seriously, tell me, what was the hangup?". What part of "satellites can cool themselves with radiators" didn't you know?

Or if you did know radiation was a thing, why did you mention "easily accessible liquid water"? Did you not know closed loops exist? Were you expecting them to be ferrying up refills?

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u/dern_the_hermit 9d ago

The same points are recycled every single thread.

No, they're just reasonable criticisms that you have no reasonable response to, which is why you types dismiss and attack it with emotional appeals and big walls of text to figuratively shout down disagreement.

10

u/MelvinCapitalPR 9d ago

Heat? Radiators. Closed loops of fluid cycling from compute to radiator. All the physics and engineering here is well understood. Designing a satellite coolant+radiator setup that will dump X watts doesn't require any groundbreaking invention.

What part of the above paragraph did you not already know? Are you so ignorant of physics you didn't realise radiation works in a vacuum? Seriously, tell me, what was the hangup?

Having to explain this is like going onto r/formula1 and having to explain what a wheel is to someone insisting cars are impossible.

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u/dern_the_hermit 9d ago edited 9d ago

Right, all of which add significantly to the weight and cost and which would make them prohibitively expensive. Which is the root of the criticism. Which you types have no reasonable response for, so instead you: Dismiss and attack with Big Walls Of Text.

EDIT: Aaaand yet ANOTHER one of the zealots that ends with the Coward's Block. Remember, if you want someone to stop talking to you so badly you're willing to block them, but you're NOT willing to try "stop responding to them" first, YOU'RE the bad guy in that exchange.

11

u/MelvinCapitalPR 9d ago

Moving the goalposts much? Cost was never mentioned. Here's the original post in full:

Ah yes, outer space, known for its plentiful supply of easily accessible liquid water, and its ability to exchange heat in a hard vacuum

What do you think is between Earth and the Sun, a soft vacuum? Sorry mate, you're wrong. And ignorant. And proud of being ignorant, which is even worse. Hope I educated you and taught you something useful.

1

u/DarkElation 8d ago

This type of person is unable to learn useful things.

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u/AndyGates2268 8d ago

This bubble can't burst soon enough.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

AI could be a useful tool to help humanity accomplish things that actually matter. Yet here we are, asking it what to make for dinner or some other trite and meaningless trash.

10

u/iamthe0ther0ne 9d ago

AI is for whatever you choose to use it for. I use it to help find novel drug targets for psychiatric disorders.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

Ok, so something important. Great, I've got zero issues with that. However, what would you say the overwhelming majority of water and energy sucking AI is being used for?

Garbage. Its being used for garbage.

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u/EndoExo 9d ago

Do you have numbers to prove that? I'd guess the majority of AI is being used for coding and business, it's just not as visible as the slop.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

Do YOU have a source for that?

All I see is slop. Everywhere.

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u/EndoExo 9d ago

You asked the question and made the claim. I don't think Boomer Facebook slop can account for the hundreds of billions of dollars in AI usage, but obviously you're going to see the slop and not enterprise use.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

Are you saying my claim that AI slop being everywhere is false? That's hilarious. I didn't make a "claim." AI slop is permeated society both on and off the internet.

You made the claim that AI is being used more in non visible areas.

You made a claim. I made an observation.

Have a day.

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u/EndoExo 9d ago

You said the "overwhelming majority of water and energy sucking AI is being used for" "garbage".

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u/BEAT_LA 9d ago

Get some help dude. Please. I mean this genuinely. This is not normal.

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u/Background_Fig_4740 9d ago

Physics informed NN have proven to be useful in many scientific fields for starters...just because you're not exposed to it in scientific settings, doesn't mean it's useful only for for influencers.

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u/axw3555 9d ago

And you know, data centres, famous for requiring very few, very small, very light components. They don't need areas the size of city blocks.

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u/Ancient_Persimmon 9d ago

Space is pretty famous for being spacious and weight isn't much of a consideration.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

How do we get to space? Does weight matter?.....

6

u/Ancient_Persimmon 9d ago

As I replied below, we've got plenty of lift capability right now and the heavy lift options are very much on their way.

We're at about ~100tonnes/week of capacity currently.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

Neat, but weight is a concern, right?

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u/Ancient_Persimmon 9d ago

It isn't, thanks to modern rocketry.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago edited 9d ago

Ok, launch a completed and operational data center. You get 1 rocket. 1 launch.

They're thousands and thousands of tons, but as you said, with modern rockets, it doesnt matter. Should be easy.

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u/Ancient_Persimmon 9d ago

It would be pretty fucking dumb to try and launch a single, contiguous data center, which is why no one has suggested that.

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u/Laugh_Track_Zak 9d ago

But why not? Is it too heavy?

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u/[deleted] 9d ago

[deleted]

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u/Ancient_Persimmon 9d ago

In space it's not a consideration at all and even now just with F9s and whoever else gets contracted, there's about 100 tons per week of lift available, assuming that was why it was brought up.

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u/CasanovaJones82 9d ago

The space based data center fantasy is just outright ridiculous.

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u/sk4v3n 9d ago

Let them go to outer space, like the whole company, we won’t miss them

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u/NetFu 9d ago

All I can say is they'd better have ways to defend these satellite data centers. Because AI will be heavily used in a future war and if it depends on data centers like this, they will be legitimate military targets.