Harvard business review looked at the the Spacex process for lowering the cost of space.
Spacex has a big goal, learned from the past, looking at the whole picture to find and prioritize opportunities, then refining key aspects of the space flight model to achieve their objective — is an approach that can make any organization more creative about cutting costs.
SpaceX approach innovates and transforms by looking at the entire business model instead of the parts. Cuts weren't just made to the physical rocket itself but to everything surrounding it — overhead, support services, development timeframe, and more.
* Sustaining cost reductions over many years
* Reinvest for more innovation
Applying to Energy
Canadian David LeBlanc (Transterrestrial Energy) is developing factory mass produced molten salt nuclear reactors.
LeBlanc envisions IMSR reactor sizes ranging from 25 MWe to 300 MWe.
* No fuel fabrication cost or salt processing = extremely low fuel costs
* Under 0.1 cents/kwh
* 200 small 300MWth MSR could be used to boost Canadian oil production by 6.4 million barrels per day
The 25 MWe version of the IMSR is the size of a fairly deep hottub
There are other factory mass produced nuclear fission reactors in development. China has a 210 MWe high temperature pebble bed reactor under construction and it should be done in about 2017. Initially it will not be cheaper than other nuclear reactors in China. Although China and South Korea have nuclear reactor construction costs that are about half the cost of other countries. China is also working on a Thorium molten salt reactor.
Most of the other small modular reactors will not be systems with the potential to radically alter the world energy mix or radically change the cost of energy.
Read Moreau at NBF
Spacex has a big goal, learned from the past, looking at the whole picture to find and prioritize opportunities, then refining key aspects of the space flight model to achieve their objective — is an approach that can make any organization more creative about cutting costs.
SpaceX approach innovates and transforms by looking at the entire business model instead of the parts. Cuts weren't just made to the physical rocket itself but to everything surrounding it — overhead, support services, development timeframe, and more.
* Sustaining cost reductions over many years
* Reinvest for more innovation
Applying to Energy
Canadian David LeBlanc (Transterrestrial Energy) is developing factory mass produced molten salt nuclear reactors.
LeBlanc envisions IMSR reactor sizes ranging from 25 MWe to 300 MWe.
* No fuel fabrication cost or salt processing = extremely low fuel costs
* Under 0.1 cents/kwh
* 200 small 300MWth MSR could be used to boost Canadian oil production by 6.4 million barrels per day
There are other factory mass produced nuclear fission reactors in development. China has a 210 MWe high temperature pebble bed reactor under construction and it should be done in about 2017. Initially it will not be cheaper than other nuclear reactors in China. Although China and South Korea have nuclear reactor construction costs that are about half the cost of other countries. China is also working on a Thorium molten salt reactor.
Most of the other small modular reactors will not be systems with the potential to radically alter the world energy mix or radically change the cost of energy.
Read Moreau at NBF