I just love when Elon Musk discusses moving TONNAGE into orbit, and farther.
The SuperHeavy Booster can today be considered operational as a one time use booster. Very soon, it will be reusable.
Bezos, Blue Origin, and SpaceX began just a short time apart. Musk and SpaceX have revolutionized rocketry. “They” said reusing rockets was a fool’s errand. One of my favorite parts of any SpaceX launch is called the “boost back burn.” After the first stage is done, it returns and lands near the launch site. The first step after booster separation is the “boost back burn” where the rocket turns and lights its engines to return to the launch site. With some SpaceX launches (both Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy) if the trajectory demands it, some boosters land on a platform in the middle of an ocean. Wherever the boosters land, they are refurbished and used again, and again, and again. Musk and SpaceX are driving down the launch costs.
Once both SuperHeavy and Starship are fully reusable, the cost of placing TONNAGE in space will fall even more.
Meanwhile, Bezos and Blue Origin have launched Captain Kirk up and down.
Yes, but the one great flaw in Musk’s StarShip and booster design is their weight. The heavier they are, the less payload they can boost to orbit & the less height they can achieve.
For example, the Pentagon has some very large and heavy satellites they want to place directly into geosynchronous orbit. No way stops, no refueling. Earth to 20,000 miles high in one shot. Currently the Falcon heavy with two Falcon 9 boosters can be used. But, the planned satellites will not fit in the Falcon Heavy fairing. So the contract was awarded to Blue Origin which will go direct to orbit and have a large enough fairing ( that the rocket has not flown is beside the point ).
StarShip cannot do that because even with a far larger fairing, it has to be refueled at least once and possibly twice. All of that takes too long & is too complicated for the Pentagon.
Which to illustrate the point further, it will take some 15 prepositioned refueling ships to get to the Moon. More to return. Why is that bad? Because each of those refueling stops has to work perfectly every time. The idea is simplicity, and here, the job is unnecessarily complex.
Don’t even ask how many refueling ships need to be prepositioned to get to and from Mars.