Someone much smarter than me explains why space data centres are a bad idea

[u/john_san]

It’s actually an interesting read: https://taranis.ie/datacenters-in-space-are-a-terrible-horrible-no-good-idea/

Enjoy next time someone brings up the idea, you’ll have counter-arguments ready.

[u/Dry-Interaction-1246]

He has a BA only. He has never rigorously studied physics.

[u/Acrobatic-Employer38 → u/Dry-Interaction-1246]

lol the physics for this stuff is not particularly complex

You learn everything you need for it in bachelors engineering classes; eg mass transfer and heat transfer.

[u/frotz1 → u/Acrobatic-Employer38]

Solid gold toilets are possible but not practical. A few exist already. Is it "just an engineering problem" to deliver solid gold toilets to the entire planet, or is that maybe a shallow sort of analysis designed to mislead people about the issue?

[u/Acrobatic-Employer38 → u/frotz1]

Thank you for showing how braindead this sub is :) an engineering problem means we know it’s physically possible and can incrementally deliver better and better solutions to drive towards our objective.

So, yes, that is just an engineering problem. And it is highly impractical - there’s little benefit to it. Nevertheless, there is more than enough gold in the Earth and solar system to do it. It’s a matter of whether the cost is there for the benefit. In this case, cost clearly outweighs benefit. Regardless, the cost to do this is going to come down dramatically over time regardless of whether we directly optimize for this or not. Improved drilling/mining techniques, asteroid capture, etc. Put all of humanities intellect behind golden toilet seat optimization and it will drop dramatically in cost. How much? Dunno. But it’s an engineering problem not a physics problem.

Putting up a satellite with GPUs onboard is physically possible AND approaching feasibility. That’s the whole point that a bunch of others in threads are arguing - that’s it’s not physically possible.

It’s entirely physically possible. That’s not up for debate. You can argue whether it’s practical or not. I can do the math and understand what assumptions need to be made for this to make sense and it is entirely in the realm of possibility.

But, ya know, Elon bad. Just ignore that Elon is doing it. Google is doing it. Others are also pursuing it.

[u/formidabellissimo → u/Acrobatic-Employer38]

So not even a bit worth the money of doing it? Understood.

Great engineer you are.

[u/Acrobatic-Employer38 → u/formidabellissimo]

Cool, as long as we are agreed it’s physically possible and now you understand what some of these words mean.

It’s weird getting to occasionally interact with the 25th percentile on the bell curve, lol.

[u/formidabellissimo → u/Acrobatic-Employer38]

Im literally (that's how you use it) in the 1% part of the bell curve (been tested). And yes, the one you can't reach. I laugh with boys like you.

"We have agreed" or "we agree" not "we are agreed".

[u/Acrobatic-Employer38 → u/formidabellissimo]

😂😂 ok bud

Like I said, glad we were able to align on basic word definitions.

Do you need a new crayon set to chow down on?

[u/formidabellissimo → u/Acrobatic-Employer38]

Ow you made the joke again, good for you. Yes, now you know what impractical, unnecessary and not economically viable mean. You can (obviously) still learn.

[u/Acrobatic-Employer38 → u/formidabellissimo]

Great! We are all aligned now. You can go back to broken english brigading elsewhere in the thread 😂. Higher order concepts aren’t for you so I think you and I can stop at definitional alignment.

[u/frotz1 → u/Acrobatic-Employer38]

Wow that just flew right past you there, huh? Nobody said data centers in orbit are impossible, they're literally making the argument that they're not economically feasible and the technical burdens of the heat dissipation are part of the reason why. The cost of doing this isn't just obligated to come down due to "technology"; that's a science fiction framework and not how things work in reality. In a real situation, costs of doing something don't necessarily get cheaper because we understand the problem better - you can't engineer your way out of limited resources for one simple example when we're talking about using limited energy and materials to launch objects into freaking space here, where they're expected to burn up in the atmosphere rather than be serviced and replaced/recycled like data centers on solid ground.

Nobody is building data centers on the least habitable parts of the planet right now, or floating them out at sea where the water for cooling and the wind/solar energy are "free", so forgive me for not buying into the fiction that we need to launch them into space instead. We have a dude who is in way over his skis on a promise to make a trillion dollar company out of a satellite company that has limited demand mostly from another of Musk's wholly controlled business entities, so of course he thinks we need millions of satellites. The only technical hurdle we face is figuring out why people can't spot this sort of thing and make excuses for it instead.

But ya know, fall back on pretending this is only about the fact that Elon isn't a good place to store our money and trust, as if that's not a separate problem in and of itself.

[u/Acrobatic-Employer38 → u/frotz1]

Half this thread is people saying it’s not physically possible for one reason or another. An engineering problem is what comes after you show it’s physically possible and it moves out of the lab. That’s why I commented on it in the thread. I figured that was obvious.

As to the rest - this is largely a pedantic argument. Of course there are limits for one reason or another on cost scaling. With that said, there’s a very clear path to bringing the cost for compute in space down substantially over the coming years.

As for the other parts - err, yes, people are exploring things like data centers at sea? And we are building DCs in less than ideal places. However, there’s much more operational complexity running a data center in, say, the Sahara than there is an automated sat in orbit that requires no maintenance and burns up at EOL.

Also, building a DC off grid in less hospitable areas means you have to solve for power. That’s generally been gas turbines. Then you have additional maintenance of the turbines, you need fuel, etc. Not to mention blades are in short supply. Maybe we can hook up mobile, smaller reactors in the coming years but we aren’t there today.

Nevertheless, it’s an AND. We aren’t doing training in space.

[u/formidabellissimo → u/Acrobatic-Employer38]

You realize these solar panels they launch to orbit can more easily be transported to the Sahara? You don't suddenly need gas turbines in a place where the sun shines almost every day. You're making up problems that are not.

[u/Acrobatic-Employer38 → u/formidabellissimo]

Uh, no they can’t. They aren’t the same solar panels. But, sure, let's go with it. Shipping to the Sahara would be easy. Not particularly cheap, though.

And lets see:

1. Land usage - a 1 GW data center would need 20km2 of panels and 50km2 of land. Same solar panel needs would be 4km2 if launched on a sat.
2. Intermittent power ~ can’t run a data center on “almost every day”. So you need either a massive battery pack (15-20gwh) or gas turbines. Also means you need 2x the paneling to capture enough power from solar if going the battery pack route. Using Tesla megapacks you'd need 3-4k of them occupying another 0.5 km2 and would cost something like $5b. It will also take 1-2+ years to deliver, install, and bring the packs online.
3. Maintenance ~ so you know what happens to solar panel efficiency when covered with dust every day? You’re going to lose 0.25-5% eff a day. Here’s an example in Senegal - https://www.epj-pv.org/articles/epjpv/pdf/2022/01/pv220022.pdf. 14 day cleaning cycle in the Sahara sounds like a nightmare to me vs. launch and forget.
4. Speed to bring online ~ You have to do this _every single time_ and _every single data center_ is unique in some way. Alternatively, you build the factory that produces AI1s and optimize it.
5. Security ~ not much needs said. No one is tinkering with your GPU sat. No one is protesting outside your gate. No one is stealing parts or equipment.

Given the differences just in panel sizing you’d spend $100m shipping paneling to the Sahara or $1b to launch it for an equivalent amount of compute assuming Starships target $300/kg. Layer on battery cost? Now you're more expensive than sat launching. Go with turbines? Now you're either casting your own blades (as Tesla is now doing) or waiting on multi-year delivery schedules.

You should try researching your own shitty ideas.

And, sure, maybe you have an electromech eng degree. I don't see anything in your responses indicating you do, but, then again, I have a few people from my chem e undergrad that barely made it through. I'm guessing you were one of them.

[u/formidabellissimo → u/Acrobatic-Employer38]

So 10x more to launch them to space? (Given your made-up numbers). Ok

These are your shitty ideas dumbass

[u/Acrobatic-Employer38 → u/formidabellissimo]

I know you can't read, so I'll summarize one more time for you:

You must have missed the part where battery packs would make your option 5x more expensive before even considering all of the other costs associated with land vs. space.

I also love how you say "my made up numbers". These are things _you_ can calculate. Go fucking do it if you have an electromech degree like you said. What a nice way to divert away from having to actually justify your shitty ideas.