If money weren't an issue, what's the best way to get maximum mass to LEO in 1 year? 5 years? 10? [closed]

Question

I can kick this over to World Building if it's more appropriate, but I was hoping to get an actual technical examination of this.

So here's the question: if money were not an issue and for some reason humanity needed to get absolutely as much mass to LEO as possible in one year, how would you go about it? What vehicles would you focus on? Any crash development you would do? Please consider all systems globally, no need to focus just on American or whatever.

How would your answer change if the timeline were five years? Ten?

Answer 1

Opinion-based, but I'll give it a shot.

In the timeframe of one year, it's not possible to develop any new launch technology of consequence; we have to rely on existing launchers, with a couple of possible exceptions for launchers that are well in development.

SpaceX has the best track record for high production rates and rapid scaling, so if I were in charge of the budget allocation, I'd put most of the money and attention on the existing Falcon 9 or Falcon Heavy. They're a reliable launcher; the first stage (and FH boosters) are reusable, so we don't have to build as many. user2702772 points out that FH gets more payload to LEO per expended second stage, but F9 might be flyable from more launch sites, so I'd guess we'd want some mix of the two. SpaceX isn't set up for a lot of concurrent flights at present, so improving launch site logistics might be as important an investment as building additional stages. We'd want to fly RTLS missions instead of barge landing missions -- less upmass per flight, but much faster turnarounds. The important thing here is that we give SpaceX the money and let them figure out how best to apply it without too much micromanagement. I'm not the biggest fan of SpaceX, but agile project development is what they're good at.

Second priority is to go to everyone else -- ULA, Roscosmos, China, ESA, ISRO -- and ask them how many rockets they can build in the next year and how much that'll cost, give them twice as much money as that, tell them to do their best, and then forget about them. Those agencies aren't set up to change their plans quickly, so I wouldn't expect too much from them.

Starship/Super Heavy and SLS are potentially useful in this scenario, and Starship/SH in particular can be relatively rapidly built, apparently, but the ultimate limit here is how much manpower can be brought into play to construct, stack, and manage the rockets. I'd give Boeing et al as much money as they thought they could spend -- one SLS launch provides something like 8 times as much mass to LEO as a RTLS Falcon 9. If SpaceX felt they could get Starship/SH flying, more power (and budget) to them, but my guess is that, logistically, it will be easier to snap up additional factory space that can accommodate manufacture of the smaller Falcon 9.

For a 5-or-more-year plan, I agree with Slarty that Starship is the smart money, but start building Falcons anyway in case the design turns out to have issues that take years to resolve. Even for a 10 year plan, I don't think Sea Dragon is the strategy to pursue; there are too many unknowns in building a booster that size.

Answer 2

In 1 year all aerospace companies resources could be requisitioned / maxed out (I'm assuming it's a free for all war like situation here). For example there would probably be scope to launch more Falcon 9 rockets with selected maxed out payloads. But options are limited.

Over 5 or 10 years the best option would be to give Elon Musk free reign with Starship, provide everything he needs and then requisition all of the capacity. If there was a national emergency the Environmental review required for launch at Boca Chica (and elsewhere) could be waved, unlimited government funding could be brought in to build further multiple launch sites at KSC and elsewhere as well.

Allowing for minimal delays it seems likely that SpaceX will achieve the first orbital flight of Starship this year and would refine that in 2022. With unlimited funding in Engineering, construction and logistical support from the US Government it seems reasonable to assume that Starship could become operational by the end of 2022.

Being reusable the cadence of Starship operations should be capable of being rapidly increased as experience was gained. And with more and more ships boosters and launch sites coming on line the number of launches could expand rapidly from 2023 on.

By 2025 there could be many hundreds of Starship launches per year and by 2030 many thousands. Each one capable of delivering 100+ tonnes to orbit and probably more like 150-200 tonnes with gradual improvements.

Answer 3

Nuclear pulse propulsion.

Nuclear pulse rockets are a form of rocket engine that involves the rocket dropping a very small shaped-charge nuclear explosive out the back and then detonating it, such that the force of the explosion is transferred to a pusher plate that is connected to the main body of the rocket via shock absorbers.

Based on the preliminary design work performed in the 60s, it would be possible for a nuclear pulse rocket to carry 6000 tons to the moon and back on one tank of fuel. If you want to get as much mass into orbit as quickly as possible, nothing can beat nuclear pulse rockets - even many other nuclear rockets are less capable of lifting mass to orbit.

Answer 4

If money truly isn't an issue, then I would build a HUGE tower in a country on the equator. (Having purchased said country outright.)

I would also need to purchase the entire steel and aluminium and much of the concrete output of the entire world.

The Earth's orbit would probably change a little as a result, but I could probably balance that out if I wanted, given that I had all the money available. A 1-year timescale might be a little tricky though...

Answer 5

If you don't care what the mass you are sending to LEO is and you really have infinite money you could ask every military around the globe to shoot every capable rocket they have into orbit. It's really hard to estimate how many of those are around, but each having a mass on the order of magnitude of 1 ton, and the ability and existing factories to produce a lot of them even in 1 year that will get you more mass into LEO than any option based on space programs.

This actually has been tested. A RIM-161 has been shot into LEO, and other countries like China and Russia also have successfully tested Anti-satellite weapons.

Answer 6

The expensive bit is getting above the first ten miles. If you really have to move a LOT of mass into LEO rather then just a few traditional satellites, then ground based rocket launches may not be the most effective way to achieve that goal. I know you said money no object but building traditional big rockets takes a lot of time and deliver very little into orbit. An option to consider is air launched. Standard air launch such as Virgins LauncherOne will put 500Kg into LEO for ~$12 million. Put if you want to launch 50 tons or more you would be a long time waiting while they built booster after booster. A compromise solution would be to fly a plane to 40'000ft or more on the equator and drop a reusable winged scramjet off the belly. This would fly to mach 8+ and 100,000ft or more before releasing a much smaller booster rocket to inject the payload into LEO. Each plane could fly six or eight times a day, the scramjets could glide back to base and be reused, so only the small booster rocket is lost on each flight. It reduces the cost of each individual launch but more importantly, it reduces the wait time required to build each booster.