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If SpaceX Starship can get going as planned (eq. fully & rapidly reusable orbital transport) it should be possible to slash the costs of launch for big proposals like this quite significantly.

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The proposal is a 5 million ton, 10 km shell of copper fueled by 30 million hydrogen bombs. Cost to orbit isn't particularly relevant (it would easily be optimized as part of the decades long project).

I’ve heard of nuclear bomb propulsion before but I had no idea that 30 million hydrogen bombs we’re proposed. That’s insane!

And do you know what's more insane (and even more cool!) - Nuclear Salt Water Rocket!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_salt-water_rocket

Riding a continuous nuclear explosion for fun and profit! :D

exactly, all these old estimates need to be revised in SpaceX era. We are living in unprecedented times when a private company does something that was previously only possible with global superpower resources.

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