Value chain · CLM-0600
In plain terms
NASA's launch price was optimistic, not pessimistic. The expensive part is its assumption that each payload needs twelve refuelling flights, which multiplies the cost thirteen times.
The claim as recorded
The disputed figure in NASA's 2024 cost model is not its launch PRICE but its orbital-transfer ARCHITECTURE: its stated launch price is 850 USD/kg to low Earth orbit (1,000 USD/kg less a 15 per cent block-buy discount), and the effective 11,050 USD/kg delivered to geostationary orbit arises almost entirely from assuming twelve tanker refuelling launches per payload launch, a factor of thirteen.
Scope and limits
The 7,462 USD/kg figure for a Falcon Heavy-class launcher is from the Caltech Joule 2025 paper as recorded in this register (SRC-006 Table 2: a projected 97 million USD per launch over 13,000 kg of that design's payload, so a projection and a packing figure, not an observed market price, and to geostationary orbit), not independently re-derived here. NASA's 850 USD/kg is to LOW EARTH ORBIT and Caltech's roughly 7,462 USD/kg is to GEOSTATIONARY ORBIT. Those are different destinations, so the claim does not compare them. The claim's conclusion is supported by Terzi and Nicoli (2026), a study of 4,405 launches. It puts the average cost of sending a kilogram to orbit in 2025, standardised to low Earth orbit, at 3,868 USD in 2024 dollars, more than four times NASA's 850 USD/kg, and estimates that Starship, if it enters service in late 2026 as the study thinks likely, would cost around 1,000 USD/kg from the start, given full reusability. NASA's 1,000 USD/kg before discount matches that projection and is well below the 2025 average, so NASA is the OPTIMISTIC party on launch price and the dispute really is about the transfer architecture.
What it assumes
No assumptions are recorded against this claim.
Where it comes from
This is the project's own working, shown in full:
Own derivation from SRC-012's stated inputs: 100 million USD per launch times (1 - 0.15 block discount) divided by 100,000 kg Starship capacity = 850 USD/kg to LEO; 850 times (1 + 12) = 11,050 USD/kg to GEO. The Space Review, 2024-02-05, reports the study assumed "a Starship launch cost of $1,000 per kilogram, with a 15% block buy discount" and "a dozen tankers per payload Starship", consistent with this derivation.
Basis: USD per kg delivered to GEO, and USD/kWh at 2024 NASA basis
Related records
- Answers question
- QST-004 not published in this release
Cite this
energyaperture.com/c/clm-0600
CLM-0600, Energy Aperture, as of 2026-09.
Connected records
Other published records linked to this one. A list, not a judgement.
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