alt Hacker NewsI doubt it'll make sense any time soon, but some arguments I can think of are that solar in space can easily be ~50% more efficient at any moment while also being continuous (enough) in the right orbit.
An even more radical idea is to put nuclear in space which would sidestep all the earthly hurdles (beyond the launch).
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Ekaros • today at 11:38 AM
Nuclear is used in space, but my understanding is that it is too low power and not really scalable to computing needs for this use case. Bonus side really is that nuclear power can provide power for very long time.
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Right, but even if you get 100% solar time in orbit and maybe 20% on the ground, I still don’t see it. Just from a procurement cost and maintenance standpoint. I think spreading a few datacenters around the world to have quasi continuous availability is easier than launching them on satellites.
> An even more radical idea is to put nuclear in space which would sidestep all the earthly hurdles (beyond the launch).
That makes even less sense to me. Why would you launch then and not just stay on the ground? Do you think a country would allow you to launch a rocket with a nuclear reactor from their land but the reactor is so unsafe that you’re not allowed to operate it on the ground?
Then I would just say put it on a boat and park it in international waters, that’s surely cheaper than orbit, right?