A few months ago we talked about whether time to start optimising for
fuel consumption is near. (The "A conversation with Elon Musk" thread in
October)

I found the following bit of information on
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Starship
"In November 2019 Elon Musk estimated that fuel will cost $900,000 per
launch and total launch costs could drop as low as $2 million".

So assuming that Starship does live up to Elon's estimate (which I think
is doubtful, but still a good ballpark figure), fuel costs could soon be
45% of total launch costs.

Of course, to lower the cost of access to space right now, the important
thing is to get rockets to be fully reusable and get total launch costs
around $20 per kg. But it seems that this will be done soon. Once it is
done, I think the 45% fuel costs will seem as a good place to reduce
costs further.


Alain Fournier