The Supply Chain for a Gigawatt
What would it take to manufacture a gigawatt-scale plant, and which parts would be scarce?
Chapter summary
a factory on the scale of a terrestrial solar or electronics plant, producing millions of identical tiles a year, plus supply chains for gigawatts of solar cells, hundreds of millions of microwave amplifiers, lightweight structures, radiators and robotic assemblers.
Key takeaways
- 1
Today's space supply chain makes satellites by the thousand, not tiles by the million, and its scarce parts, high-efficiency solar cells, gallium-based chips, rad-hard electronics, are exactly those a plant would need most (Study S7).
- 2
A gigawatt plant would therefore depend on adapting terrestrial manufacturing to space requirements, the same path Starlink took for satellites but at a much larger scale.
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