SpaceX
SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy could launch astronauts to the Moon, says NASA admin
Despite contrary comments made one week prior, NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine has affirmed – this time in no uncertain terms – that a two-week study investigating commercial options for launching the Orion spacecraft to the Moon has concluded that Falcon Heavy could be the only practical option if NASA chooses to proceed.
Due to fundamental performance and logistical constraints of both Delta IV Heavy and Falcon Heavy, as well as a lack in confidence in certain alternative paths, NASA now believes that a commercial option – Falcon Heavy – exists, but would face multiple major challenges, to the extent that Bridenstine indicated it would not be able to make the 2020 launch deadline with an unspecified budget. However, unlike his March 27th statements to Congress, he told the NASA stakeholder audience that the complex Falcon Heavy configuration “could be used in the future if [NASA can] get through all of [the challenges].” Reading between the lines, Administrator Bridenstine has effectively put the expensive and delay-ridden SLS rocket on notice if its contractors – primarily Boeing – fail to rise to the challenge and accelerate the rocket’s launch debut.
The April 1st comments – made before an audience of major NASA center leaders – are in stark contrast to dozens of comments made by Bridenstine in response to members of Congress on March 27th, in which he repeatedly went to bat for SLS launching Orion on EM-1 while scarcely mentioning commercial alternatives.
Despite the apparent incoherence of Administrator Bridenstine’s continuing comments, the sad – but also promising –
Sitting before the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation committee on March 13th, he announced the commercial Orion launch study as a token of recognition that NASA needs to get better at staying on-schedule and on-budget for US taxpayers and Congressional purse string-holders. After the US Vice President challenged NASA to return humans to the Moon with any means necessary by 2024, Bridenstine affirmed that NASA would do everything in its power to meet that charge, including the exploitation of commercial alternatives. In a March 27th hearing before members of Congress with explicit stakes in the SLS rocket’s pork, he barely mentioned commercial alternatives for Orion EM-1, instead focusing on a paired study aiming to accelerate the SLS launch debut schedule while also reiterating his confidence that Boeing and other contractors can rise to the occasion.
In his latest April 1st comments on commercial launch alternatives for Orion’s Moon mission debut, Bridenstine spoke to nearly all of NASA’s major center, program, and directive managers and stuck to the technical facts of the matters at hand. He repeatedly acknowledged that both launching an uncrewed Orion spacecraft to the Moon before the end of 2020 and returning astronauts to its surface by the end of 2024 would be extraordinary challenges and could require far-reaching changes and reforms throughout NASA. He also reaffirmed his intent to ensure that nothing be taken off the table as an option to accomplish those ambitious goals. This included an indication that (in more polite terms, of course) the
We see, in history, that in the past we have had an agenda to get to the Moon and then the resources don’t materialize and it gets canceled, and then we have another agenda to go to the Moon and the resources don’t materialize and it gets canceled. From my perspective, it is my objective to get the resources necessary to accomplish [this goal]. It is also my commitment to make sure that people understand the history here and that we can have a great, ambitious goal, but without the resources, it won’t be accomplished.
NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, 04/01/2019
“A whole host of challenges”
The specifics of what the NASA administrator briefly hinted at for a Falcon Heavy launch of EM-1 are spectacular enough to warrant additional discussion. According to Bridenstine, the two-week study NASA conducted essentially concluded that ULA’s Delta IV Heavy rocket was not a practical option for several major reasons. First, it seems that NASA has little to no confidence that Lockheed Martin and its contractors would be able to retrofit EM-1’s Orion and European Service Module (ESM) with the hardware and software needed for on-orbit rendezvous with a boost stage in time for a 2020 launch. Those capabilities were not planned for Orion until EM-3, NET 2024 in an absolute best-case scenario. This would entirely preclude a distributed launch solution, regardless of whether Delta IV Heavy is capable of placing the payloads in orbit.
Even if a rendezvous was on the table, a distributed launch scenario would still be impossible with either two Falcon Heavies or Delta IV Heavies, as both launches would have to occur as close to simultaneously as possible – optimally just a few hours apart. SpaceX has only one pad capable of supporting Falcon Heavy, while ULA’s Delta IV Heavy has two pads, but only one that can launch to the required orbit. A bigger problem: Delta IV Heavy is capable of launching no more than ~28,400 kg (63,000 lb) to an altitude of ~200 km (120 mi), which definitely rules out a Delta IV Heavy launch of the ICPS upper stage (~30,000 kg, 66,000 lb) and could also fall short for Orion/ESM (~26,000 kg, 57,000 lb), assuming that both would need to be launched to an elliptical orbit of 1800 km (1150 mi).
Reddit /u/DoYouWonda actually visualized this potential (but highly improbable) scenario and published a brief abstract analyzing the possibility on March 15th. (Reddit /u/DoYouWonda, minor edits by Teslarati)
Due to NASA’s implied assumption that on-orbit rendezvous of Orion and a booster stage is out of the question and the potential performance shortcomings of Delta IV Heavy, as well as Falcon Heavy’s inability to launch Orion/ESM towards lunar orbit, only one option apparently remains. According to Bridenstine, NASA concluded that a mission profile in which Falcon Heavy places Orion, a service module, and an ICPS upper stage in orbit in a single launch may actually be a serious option – and the only option – for a near-term commercial alternative for Orion’s first operational test flight. The unofficial graphic above offers a rough glimpse of what that massive payload might look like atop Falcon Heavy.
[Finally], there is another solution out there: a Falcon Heavy with an ICPS at the top – talk about strange bedfellows – and an ESM and Orion crew capsule. That ultimately has the ability to potentially – gosh, [NASA Associate Administrator Bill] Gerst is gonna be so mad at me for saying all of this… by the way, none of this was cleared by Gerstenmaier, he’s still the best rocket scientist we have [camera pans to Gerst, laughter], no insult to anyone else in the room – so, at the end of the day, there is a solution here that could potentially work for the future.
It would require time, it would require cost, and there is risk involved, but guess what? If we’re gonna land boots on the Moon in 2024, we have time, and we have the ability to accept some risk and make some modifications. All of that is on the table. There is nothing sacred here that is off the table, and [FH+ICPS+Orion/ESM] is a potential capability that could help us land on the Moon in 2024.
NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, 04/01/2019
Combined, the Orion spacecraft, its ESM, and a fueled ICPS boost stage would weigh no less than 56,000 kg (~123,000 lb) at launch, relative to Falcon Heavy’s reported expendable performance of about 64,000 kg (140,000 lb) to Low Earth Orbit (LEO). In other words, it’s possible that Falcon Heavy could effectively do the exact same job as SLS would need to do to perform a nominal Orion EM-1 orbital insertion. However, a huge number of challenges remain for such an exotic Falcon Heavy configuration. Pad 39A would need to be outfitted with an array of systems, including a liquid hydrogen propellant plant and the ability to load Orion and its service module with hypergolic propellant while atop Falcon Heavy and vertical on the pad. To allow for vertical Orion/ESM/ICPS processing and fueling and support the massive weight and height (~95m vs. 70m) of the vehicle, the transporter-erector would need to be heavily modified. Additionally, Falcon Heavy’s aerodynamic characteristics would need to be entirely reanalyzed for such a significantly taller payload fairing.
But, as Bridenstine made clear above, those challenges would be par for the course of accomplishing something as audacious as returning humans to the Moon in less than six years. Whether or not NASA actually pursues or Congress funds such an alternative beyond the drawing board, the cat is now officially out of the bag. A potentially satisfactory replacement for SLS will now hang over the program’s head for the indefinite future, a constant threat in the (quite likely) event that the many SLS/Orion contractors fail – once again – to even loosely adhere to their budget and schedule targets. Falcon Heavy will be waiting.
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Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s TERAFAB project: Everything you need to know
The CEO has hinted heavily for several quarters that it would probably need to produce its own computing power to stay up to speed on the demand it is facing for its projects. It is now taking matters into its own hands.
On Sunday, Elon Musk formally made TERAFAB official—a groundbreaking $20-25 billion joint venture uniting Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI, three of the world’s richest man’s most significant and powerful ventures.
Musk described the project as “the most epic chip building exercise in history by far.”
Elon Musk launches TERAFAB: The $25B Tesla-SpaceXAI chip factory that will rewire the AI industry
The initiative aims to produce over one terawatt of AI compute annually, dwarfing the global industry’s current output of roughly 20 gigawatts per year. Musk framed the effort as “the next step towards becoming a galactic civilization,” positioning it as essential for scaling humanity into a multi-planetary species.
The Need for TERAFAB
Existing chip suppliers such as TSMC, Samsung, and Micron cannot expand quickly enough to meet the explosive demand for AI hardware.
We’re building TERAFAB to close the gap between today’s chip production & the future’s demand – a future among the stars.
Join us → https://t.co/512DIlqNgY pic.twitter.com/ATr0e0pRDJ
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) March 22, 2026
Musk explained the situation clearly:
“We’re very grateful to our existing supply chain… but there’s a maximum rate at which they’re comfortable expanding. We either build the Terafab or we don’t have the chips, and we need the chips, so we build the Terafab.”
The CEO has hinted heavily for several quarters that it would probably need to produce its own computing power to stay up to speed on the demand it is facing for its projects. It is now taking matters into its own hands.
Chip Types and Production Goals
The facility will manufacture two specialized chip families, according to the presentation:
- Edge-inference AI5 and AI6 processors optimized for Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robots and Full Self-Driving systems in vehicles and Robotaxis
- High-power D3 chips hardened for space environments
Musk outlined annual output targets, which are between 100 and 200 gigawatts of terrestrial compute for robotics, supporting Musk’s vision of producing 1-10 billion Optimus units per year, and the majority (80%) of chips dedicated to orbital AI data centers. Overall, TERAFAB aims to produce 100-200 billion custom AI and memory chips each year.
Scale and Strategy
The size of the TERAFAB project will be remarkable, as Musk indicated after the presentation that the entire Gigafactory Texas campus would not be large enough to fit the needs of the project. In fact, Musk said it would be around 100 million square feet in size, the equivalent of 15 Pentagons or three Central Parks.
Yes, the one in New York City.
Construction will begin with an “advanced technology fab” on the Giga Texas campus in Austin, enabling rapid iteration: design a chip, fabricate lithography masks, produce and test wafers, all within days.
However, the full-scale TERAFAB requires thousands of acres and over 10 gigawatts of power, far exceeding what Giga Texas can accommodate. Musk stated:
“We couldn’t possibly fit the Terafab on the GigaTexas campus. It will be far bigger than everything else combined there.”
Multiple large sites are currently under consideration, but this will need a sprawling land mass to get started.
The sheer scale of TERAFAB is going to be insane.
Elon said it wouldn’t be suitable for anywhere on Giga Texas property because it’s too big:“We couldn’t possibly fit the Terafab on the GigaTexas campus. It will be far bigger than everything else combined there.
Several… pic.twitter.com/79GbhNNuf4
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) March 23, 2026
Key Applications
TERAFAB will be a crucial part of the development of some of Tesla’s most valuable projects, including Optimus and data center development, especially from an orbital standpoint. For that reason, we will break this down into Terrestrial and Orbital applications:
- Terrestrial: Powers autonomous vehicle fleets and billions of Optimus robots performing physical labor
- Orbital: Starship will launch massive AI satellite constellations, starting with 100-kilowatt “Mini” units, and scaling to larger Megawatt models, creating the world’s largest data center in low-Earth orbit.
Space-based advantages include five times greater solar irradiance, efficient vacuum heat rejection, and freedom from terrestrial grid constraints (U.S. electricity generation totals just 0.5 terawatts). Musk emphasized the principle:
“Quantity has a quality all its own.”
We wrote about SpaceX’s recent filing with the FCC for 1 million orbital data center plans.
Strategic Vision
TERAFAB represents vertical integration at an unprecedented scale, combining AI hardware, robotics, and orbital infrastructure.
Musk described the project as “the final missing piece of the puzzle.” With production ramping toward 2027, TERAFAB is set to accelerate an era of abundance, transforming science fiction into reality and positioning Musk’s companies at the forefront of galactic-scale innovation.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk launches TERAFAB: The $25B Tesla-SpaceXAI chip factory that will rewire the AI industry
Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI unveiled TERAFAB, a $25B chip factory targeting one terawatt of AI compute annually.
Elon Musk took the stage over the weekend at the defunct Seaholm Power Plant in Austin, Texas, to officially unveil TERAFAB, a $20-25 billion joint venture between Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI that he described as “the most epic chip building exercise in history by far.” The announcement marks the most ambitious infrastructure bet Musk has made since Gigafactory 1 in Sparks, Nevada, and it fuses three of his companies into a single, vertically integrated AI hardware machine for the first time.
TERAFAB is designed to consolidate every stage of semiconductor production under one roof, including chip design, lithography, fabrication, memory production, advanced packaging, and testing. At full capacity, the facility would scale to roughly 70% of the global output from the current world’s largest semiconductor foundry from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC).
Elon Musk’s stated goal is one terawatt of computing power annually, split between Tesla’s AI5 inference chips for vehicles and Optimus robots, and D3 chips built specifically for SpaceXAI’s orbital satellite constellation.
Tesla Terafab set for launch: Inside the $20B AI chip factory that will reshape the auto industry
The logic behind the merger of these three entities is rooted in a supply chain crisis Musk has been signaling for over a year. At Tesla’s Q4 2025 earnings call, he warned investors that external chip capacity from TSMC, Samsung, and Micron would hit a ceiling within three to four years. “We’re very grateful to our existing supply chain, to Samsung, TSMC, Micron and others,” Musk acknowledged at the Terafab event, “but there’s a maximum rate at which they’re comfortable expanding.” Building in-house was, in his framing, not a strategic option, but a necessity.
The space angle is where the announcement becomes genuinely unprecedented. Musk said 80% of Terafab’s compute output would be directed toward space-based orbital AI satellites, arguing that solar irradiance in space is roughly 5x greater than at Earth’s surface, and that heat rejection in vacuum makes thermal scaling viable. This directly feeds the SpaceXAI vision, which is betting that within two to three years, running AI workloads in orbit will be cheaper than doing so on the ground. The satellites, powered by constant solar energy, would effectively turn low Earth orbit into the world’s largest data center.
Will Tesla join the fold? Predicting a triple merger with SpaceX and xAI
Historically, this announcement threads together every major Musk initiative of the past two years: the xAI-SpaceX merger, Tesla’s $2.9 billion solar equipment talks with Chinese suppliers, the 100 GW domestic solar manufacturing push, the Optimus humanoid robot program, and Starship’s development. TERAFAB is the capstone that ties them into a single coherent architecture — chips made on Earth, launched by SpaceX, powered by Tesla solar, run by xAI, and ultimately extended to the Moon.
“I want us to live long enough to see the mass driver on the moon, because that’s going to be incredibly epic,”Musk said during the presentation.
Announcing TERAFAB: the next step towards becoming a galactic civilization https://t.co/IDKey07mJa
— Tesla (@Tesla) March 22, 2026
Elon Musk
SpaceX is quietly becoming the U.S. Military’s only reliable rocket
Space Force drops ULA for SpaceX on GPS launch after Vulcan rocket anomaly investigation halts flights.
The U.S. Space Force announced today it is switching an upcoming GPS III satellite launch from United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan rocket to a SpaceX Falcon 9, a move that is as much a reflection of Vulcan’s mounting problems as it is a validation of SpaceX’s growing dominance in national security space launch. The GPS III Space Vehicle 09, originally contracted to fly on Vulcan this month, will now target a late April liftoff on Falcon 9, marking the fourth consecutive GPS III satellite the Space Force has moved to SpaceX after contracts were originally awarded to ULA.
The immediate trigger is a solid rocket motor anomaly that occurred on February 12 during Vulcan’s USSF-87 mission. Although the payloads reached orbit and ULA declared the mission successful, the company characterized the malfunction as a “significant performance anomaly” and has since paused all military launches on Vulcan pending a root cause investigation.
“With this change, we are answering the call for rapid delivery of advanced GPS capability while the Vulcan anomaly investigation continues,” said Systems Delta 81 Commander Col. Ryan Hiserote. “We are once again demonstrating our team’s flexibility and are fully committed to leverage all options available for responsive and reliable launch for the Nation.”
The broader reality is that SpaceX’s reliability record and launch cadence have made it the path of least resistance for the Pentagon, and bodes well with Elon Musk’s plans to IPO SpaceX sometime this year. Its Falcon 9 is the most flight-proven rocket in history, and the Space Force’s Rapid Response Trailblazer program was specifically designed to enable exactly this kind of provider swap for GPS missions, and effectively building SpaceX’s flexibility into the national security launch architecture by design.
For ULA, the stakes are existential. The company entered 2026 with aspirations of finally turning a corner after years of Vulcan delays, with interim CEO John Elbon pointing to a backlog of over 80 missions as reason for optimism. Meanwhile, SpaceX’s contracts with the Space Force have given it a formal pathway to take on even more national security launches going forward.
The significance of today’s announcement extends beyond one satellite swap. It reinforces that America’s most critical space infrastructure, including GPS, missile warning, and beyond, is increasingly dependent on a single commercial provider.
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