No earlier than (NET) 7:08 pm EDT (23:08 UTC), August 4th, a flight-proven Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to lift off from SpaceX’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station LC-40 pad as part of the company’s 34th launch of 2022.
Carrying the Korean Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter (KPLO) spacecraft, the mission will be SpaceX’s first direct launch to the Moon and could also make South Korea one of just a handful of countries that have successfully entered orbit around a planetary body other than Earth.
SpaceX has assigned former Falcon Heavy booster B1052 to its first Moon launch. After debuting in April 2019 and supporting another Falcon Heavy launch in June, the former ‘side booster’ sat dormant for almost 1000 days as virtually every payload contracted to launch on the most powerful operational rocket ran into months or even years of delays. Eventually, SpaceX gave up waiting and converted the vehicle into a Falcon 9 booster, and Falcon 9 B1052 debuted on January 31st, 2022. KPLO will be its sixth launch overall and fourth mission as a Falcon 9.
Technically, KPLO won’t be the first payload SpaceX has helped launch to the Moon. That distinction is held by Israel’s Beresheet Moon lander, which launched as a rideshare payload on an otherwise ordinary Falcon 9 geostationary communications satellite mission in 2019. The spacecraft’s landing was unsuccessful but it did enter a stable orbit around the Moon before things went wrong.
Instead of launching the satellite as a rideshare payload to an Earth orbit, KPLO (also known as Danuri) will be the only spacecraft aboard Falcon 9, and the SpaceX rocket will directly send the orbiter on a type of trans-lunar injection (TLI) trajectory known as a Ballistic Lunar Transfer. A BLT is much slower than some alternative TLI trajectories, but it trades speed for exceptional efficiency, making the launch easier for Falcon 9 and ultimately giving the orbiter more useful time around the Moon by requiring less propellant to enter orbit.
If all goes to plan, KPLO – weighing about 678 kilograms (~1500 lb) at liftoff – will complete several trajectory correction burns and eventually enter orbit around the Moon in mid-December. Outfitted with several cameras, a networking experiment, and a few scientific instruments, the spacecraft’s main purpose is to scout for a flat, debris-free area for a future Korean Moon lander.

That unnamed follow-on mission will be even more domestic, as South Korea intends to launch it with its own Nuri rocket. After falling just shy of success during its first orbital launch attempt in October 2021, Nuri successfully reached orbit during its second launch attempt in June 2022.
KPLO is one of up to six launches planned around the world on August 4th, including two Chinese missions, a ULA launch on the US East Coast, a Rocket Lab mission out of New Zealand, and Blue Origin’s latest suborbital tourist launch. Barring delays, KPLO will be the last launch of the day. SpaceX’s official webcast will likely begin around 6:55 pm EDT (22:50 UTC).
Elon Musk
Elon Musk: Self-sustaining city on Mars is plausible in 25-30 years
Musk noted that true self-sufficiency requires Mars to develop “all the ingredients of civilization.”

Elon Musk has stated that a self-sustaining human settlement on Mars could be established in 25-30 years, provided launch capacity increases dramatically in the coming decades.
Speaking at the All-In Summit, the SpaceX CEO said building a self-sufficient colony depends on exponential growth in “tonnage to Mars” with each launch window, highlighting Starship’s role as the company’s pathway to interplanetary initiatives.
Mars settlement goals
Musk noted that true self-sufficiency requires Mars to develop “all the ingredients of civilization,” from food production to microchip manufacturing. Starship Version 3 is expected to support the first uncrewed Mars test flights, while future iterations could reach 466 feet in height and deliver larger payloads critical for settlement. Ultimately, Musk stated that an aggressive timeline for a city on Mars could be as short as 30 years, as noted in a Space.com report.
“I think it can be done in 30 years, provided there’s an exponential increase in the tonnage to Mars with each successive Mars transfer window, which is every two years. Every two years, the planets align and you can transfer to Mars.
“I think in roughly 15, but maybe as few as 10, but 10-15-ish Mars transfer windows. If you’re seeing exponential increases in the tonnage to Mars with each Mars transfer window, then it should be possible to make Mars self-sustaining in about call it roughly 25 years,” Musk said.
Starship’s role
Starship has flown in a fully stacked configuration ten times, most recently in August when it completed its first payload deployment in orbit. The next flight will close out the Version 2 program before transitioning to Starship Version 3, featuring Raptor 3 engines and a redesigned structure capable of lifting over 100 tons to orbit.
While SpaceX has demonstrated Super Heavy booster reuse, Ship reusability remains in development. Musk noted that the heat shield is still the biggest technical hurdle, as no orbital vehicle has yet achieved rapid, full reuse.
“For full reusability of the Ship, there’s still a lot of work that remains on the heat shield. No one’s ever made a fully reusable orbital heat shield. The shuttle heat shield had to go through nine months of repair after every flight,” he said.
News
Tesla Model Y may gain an extra 90 miles of range with Panasonic’s next-gen battery
The Japanese company is pursuing an anode-free design.

Panasonic is developing a new high-capacity EV battery that could potentially extend the range of a Tesla Model Y by 90 miles.
The Japanese company, one of Tesla’s key battery suppliers, is pursuing an anode-free design that it says could deliver a “world-leading” level of capacity by the end of 2027.
Panasonic’s anode-free design
The technology Panasonic is pursuing would eliminate the anode during the manufacturing process, as noted in a Reuters report. By freeing up space for more active cathode materials such as nickel, cobalt, and aluminum, the Japanese company expects a 25% increase in capacity without expanding battery size.
That could allow Tesla’s Model Y to gain an estimated 145 kilometers (90 miles) of additional range if equipped with a battery that matches its current pack’s size. At the same time, Panasonic could use smaller, lighter batteries to achieve the Model Y’s current range.
Panasonic also aims to reduce reliance on nickel, which remains one of the more costly raw materials. A senior executive previewed the initiative to reporters ahead of a scheduled presentation by Panasonic Energy’s technology chief, Shoichiro Watanabe.
Tesla implications
The breakthrough, if achieved, could strengthen Panasonic’s position as Tesla’s longest-standing battery partner at a time when the automaker is preparing to enter an era of extreme scale driven by high-volume products like the Cybercab and Optimus.
Elon Musk has stated that products like Optimus would be manufactured at very high scale, so it would likely be an all-hands-on-deck situation for the company’s suppliers.
Panasonic did not share details on production costs or how quickly the new batteries might scale for commercial applications. That being said, the Japanese supplier has long been a partner of Tesla, so it makes sense for the company to also push for the next generation of battery innovation while the EV maker pursues even more lofty ambitions.
Elon Musk
Tesla called ‘biggest meme stock we’ve ever seen’ by Yale associate dean

Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) is being called “the biggest meme stock we’ve ever seen” by Yale School of Management Senior Associate Dean Jeff Sonnenfeld, who made the comments in a recent interview with CNBC.
Sonnenfeld’s comments echo those of many of the company’s skeptics, who argue that its price-to-earnings ratio is far too high when compared to other companies also in the tech industry. Tesla is often compared to companies like Apple, Nvidia, and Microsoft when these types of discussions come up.
Fundamentally, yes, Tesla does trade at a P/E level that is significantly above that of any comparable company.
However, it is worth mentioning that Tesla is not traded like a typical company, either.
Here’s what Sonnenfeld said regarding Tesla:
“This is the biggest meme stock we’ve ever seen. Even at its peak, Amazon was nowhere near this level. The PE on this, well above 200, is just crazy. When you’ve got stocks like Nvidia, the price-earnings ratio is around 25 or 30, and Apple is maybe 35 or 36, Microsoft around the same. I mean, this is way out of line to be at a 220 PE. It’s crazy, and they’ve, I think, put a little too much emphasis on the magic wand of Musk.”
Many analysts have admitted in the past that they believe Tesla is an untraditional stock in the sense that many analysts trade it based on narrative and not fundamentals. Ryan Brinkman of J.P. Morgan once said:
“Tesla shares continue to strike us as having become completely divorced from the fundamentals.”
Dan Nathan, another notorious skeptic of Tesla shares, recently turned bullish on the stock because of “technicals and sentiment.” He said just last week:
“I think from a trading perspective, it looks very interesting.”
Nathan said Tesla shares show signs of strength moving forward, including holding its 200-day moving average and holding against current resistance levels.
Sonnenfeld’s synopsis of Tesla shares points out that there might be “a little too much emphasis on the magic wand of Musk.”
Elon Musk just bought $1 billion in Tesla stock, his biggest purchase ever
This could refer to different things: perhaps his recent $1 billion stock buy, which sent the stock skyrocketing, or the fact that many Tesla investors are fans and owners who do not buy and sell on numbers, but rather on news that Musk might report himself.
Tesla is trading around $423.76 at the time of publication, as of 3:25 p.m. on the East Coast.
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