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SpaceX Announces Bigger Rocket
bullitB writes "SpaceX, a commercial developer of rocket systems, has announced a new Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) class rocket. Dubbed the Falcon 9, the rocket will be able to launch nearly 25 metric tons into low earth orbit for a mere $78 million. It looks like they have already signed up Bigelow Aerospace for a launch in 2008."
No, that's a stupid thing to suggest. Firstly it isn't achieving escape velocity only orbital velocity. Secondly consider how much waste there is in sending a rocket into space, the energy, the raw materials of the rocket, and compare that to the level of resource usage when you simply dump 25 tonnes of garbage into a hole.
The real question, is why would you want to? You can break apart the vast majority of our garbage into metals, glass, plastics, wood, and plant/animal material. Most of this is being buried (except in cities which are too stupid for words and throw it in the ocean). The wood/plant/animal material decays producing methane which can be captured for energy production. The plastic and metals 50 years ago were difficult to recycle. Not anymore. We can dig that stuff back up and use these. Considering the high quality of the waste from back then, it should be easy to obtain useful metal/plastics. Even waste dumps from the last 20 years should yield 100s of tons of useful metal, glass, and plastic that can be recycled.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
That's, oh, one tenth of the cost of a shuttle launch these days? And can the shuttle even lift that much weight?