Elon Musk

We've now landed the boost stage over 500 times.

But we have to throw away the upper stage.

The upper stage sort of burns up on reentry for Falcon 9.

And the cost of that is equivalent to a small to medium-sized jet.

But with Starship, which is a giant rocket, it's the largest flying machine ever made.

That's the rocket that you're using for the idea of going to Mars, right?

Yeah, Mars and the moon, as well as for high-volume satellite stuff.

So Starship, hopefully this year we should prove full reusability for Starship, which will be a profound invention because the cost of access to space will drop by a factor of 100.

when you achieve full reusability.

It's the same sort of economic difference that you would expect between, say, a reusable aircraft and a non-reusable aircraft.

Like if you have to throw your aircraft away after every flight, that would be a very expensive flight.

But if you only have to refuel, then it's the cost of the fuel.

And so that's really the...

the fundamental breakthrough that gets the cost of access to space, we think, below the cost of freight on aircraft.

So, you know, under $100 a pound type of thing, easily.

So, it makes...

putting large satellites into space very cheap.

And then when you have solar in space, you get five times more effectiveness, maybe even more than that, than solar on the ground.

Because it's always sunny.

It's cold.