Have you ever wondered where SpaceX gets their rocket fuel? As SpaceX continues to develop their reusable rockets, the cost of fuel will become more and more important. This video looks at how SpaceX sources and transports rocket fuel to their test site in Boca Chica for use on their Starship rocket.
References
www.primalspace.shop/blogs/ne...
Thanks to the following channels for their awesome footage!
NASASpaceflight/BocaChicaGal / nasaspaceflight
LabPadre / labpadre
RGVAerialPhotography / rgvaerial
ExxonMobil / exxonmobil
Tommy J. Saenz / @tommyjsaenz
HASSELL / hassellstudio
Everyday Astronaut / @everydayastronaut
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Music used in this video:
» Infinite Perspective - Kevin MacLeod
» Sunrise Drive - South London HiFi
» Double You - The Mini Vandals
» Proud - Bobby Renz
» Eureka - Huma-Huma
» Long Road Ahead B - Kevin MacLeod
Credits:
Written and edited by Ewan Cunningham ( / ewan_cee )
Narrated by: Beau Stucki
#SpaceX #Starship #RocketFuel
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very cool sir
I think yes or...no,it's hard to judge with a portion of information about it,so let's just wait for the 15km test flight,it's going to be very excited
Read my comment, it's relevant.
@@burper-oe6tm nope
Not you, Primal Space
This fuels my imagination
BudumpdumpTCH
With what?
@@randominternetwanderer6295 with Void
@@andrea-t-pagano thats sad :(
@@randominternetwanderer6295 Void is the principle of exploration
I still waiting for the 15km test flight,it's going to be a very historical moment
It will look so amazing! I can’t even imagine how a 9 meter wide rocket would look like doing the belly flop maneuver Edit: I know there’s animations of SN8 but, real life would be MUCH cooler
@@MK-xc7pl IKR it's like really huge and magnificent. It also going to do a very cool move that possibly destroy itself
@@Hygix_ even if it does blow up, SpaceX can find a solution, I’m sure! :)
@@MK-xc7pl yes
When that will happen ?
2:45 AFAIK, there isn't enough methane in the atmosphere. They're planning on using the Sabatier process to pull CO2 out of the atmosphere and create H2O and CH4 out of it
The Sabatier process are as far as I know a very energy intensive process. Is there enough sunlight on Mars available or this process? And what about those relative often dust storms on Mars? I wish Elon all the best.
@Joe Cosgrove Childish.
@@hawkeye-vv4kb Nuclear power plants will solve the energy problem. NASA plans to install nuclear plants in Moon by 2027 and then in Mars.
@@hawkeye-vv4kb It does need an insane amount of power, but they also have at least 6 months to produce 1 tank of ch4 and lox. It's not a whole lot per day, but it would take a couple football fields of solar panels
The Sabatier process reacts hydrogen (form electrolysed water) and CO2 in the presence of a catalyst at high pressure and 400 C to get water and methane. This gets fuel and oxidizer in the same go.
Wind farm powering oxygen liquification: "We used the wind to capture the wind"
The small village of boca chica will become a huge premium city in the future
It will likely remain outside of any such city for a while. Rockets are incredibly loud, and building near an active test site is dangerous. I imagine that nearby citys will grow, but Boca Chica itself will become something of an industrial district. Especially if the boring company makes some tunnels around there, reducing the need for people to live close to work.
@@thermophile2106 Ok like prypiat for chernobyl, but what if we invent better sound walls like we already have for rockets (water, craters...)
@@cpu6850 That's not how sound walls work 😂 Best solution is to launch from remote sea platforms, and SpaceX is already planning this.
@@MortyMortyMorty @Morty :) was referring to the channel's video on the subject. But actually it makes me think in terms of physics about wave superposition, used electronically in noise reduction ear buds.
Dude they are trying to make it the new kennedy space center
0:35 for many rockets, fuel is the cheapest part, the hardware that goes into making these rockets is the main reason to why rockets are so damn expensive. Edit: But the video is great man! Good job.
Yes, but the whole point is that since the Starship is 100% renewable, fuel price actually becomes a thought.
@@nathanb011 at that time stamp, he wasn't talking just about Starship, he was talking about rockets as a whole, and in that scenario fuel is not the most expensive part, just imagine throwing away an entire Saturn V And yes I think this was a awesome video even after 8 months
@@The.RandomTube No... he was specifically talking about the costs of REUSEABLE rockets. Take another listen.... clearly talking about how with the improvement of reusable rockets, fuel is one of the most expensive parts of the rocket. I can really only think of spacex and blue origin that have actual reusable rockets, and only spacex that truly takes strides to do so. On a starship, the approximate cost is $1 million for the fuel, and $1 million to refurbish the ship. Further confirmed by conversations he had with the military to contract these out for $2 million a launch.
@@ryanthompson3737 0:33 " And one of the largest costs involved in launching A rocket is the fuel"
@TheRandomTube...No, I heard what I wanted to hear and there is no way you can change my mind. The anonymity of the internet has given ME and only ME the authority to control any and all things under the sun....deal with it.
I love your channel from india
Damn, imagine if one of these tanks exploded.
would be quite the pop
Now let's make it happen team!
Please refer to the Amos-6 static fire test.
ur imagination has now come true
5:45 IOW, they're *distilling the atmosphere.*
I wonder how the process would have to be changed if the boiling point of oxygen was in between 🤔🧐
Or rather, how do you get liquid argon-
@@etherealstars5766 you capture the argon gas as it boils off
@@darkfur18 5head thanks
@@harsh_adukia no it doesn't. You can also vacuum distill something
Great video! Very nicely done graphics. Keep em coming! Do one on where they get their welders. The men, not the machines.
Friends Help please
If you’re going through rough times, please don’t give up. Better times are coming ❤️
I find myself reviewing Falcon Heavy test flight.
@Joe Cosgrove it's just happen, he doesn't need to prove anything
@@r_thekingslayerx4352 Not everyone will have better times in their life. Not everyone will see things get better. There is no value in holding out for better times if it cannot be demonstrated that it has a high probability of happening and that demonstration would have to occur on an individual by individual bases.
i shidded
I only look to spaceflight innovations to cheer me up
I’ve learned so much in this video! Thanks so much! You have a new subscriber! Please make more videos like this! 💯
A starship launch is just expensive as the fuel needed for launch Amaizing!!
@Joe Cosgrove ... what is false?
@@ernestgalvan9037 No vehicle costs just the fuel cost. In reality if you have to replace a part after say 100 launches. Then every launch costs an addition of 1/100th that parts cost. If you need to pay personnel to manage equipment for a launch then each person's pay needs to be factored into each launch. If you have ground facilities that need maintenance or parts replaced then a percentage of that costs needs to go into each launch. There is a good reason airliners have the majority of the cost in other areas besides fuel even though the plane is fully reusable. The only reason starships fuel costs will be more than 50% of the total launch costs is rockets are mostly fuel and oxidizer.
Awesome video! really good info! I was actually just wondering about how much they pay for the fuel and how it's produced, really appreciate you explaining the process!
I live at Brownsville I have seen starship before it’s so cool!
Thanks for showing us I’ve been designing a spaceship and wondered about fuel. Luckily I saw this video thanks again
6:30 *"Space-X could use the **_Sabatier process_** of separating oxygen from H2O"* Pretty sure the Sabatier process is for making methane... not oxygen.. The oxygen could be extracted from the H2O using electrolysis.
@@RobertLutece909 yep, i noticed that too. Lol. Somebody needs to do some more research, or have others proof the scripts before publishing the videos :-P
@@jhyland87 "The water could be extracted from the H2O..." Damn separate water from water
@@person8064 lol, typo. Meant oxygen. Eye arr smrt
Thank you for making this, I don't know anything about this topic.
As always very nice video. But please use metric units
Very informative.. I am really enjoying each video.... thanks for sharing ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This was phenomenal...
Btw all your videos are entertaining. I can't even leave the video because it's so entertaining
There's far too little methane in martian atmosphere, they use carbon dioxide and water in the sabatier process.
Friends
*plan to use
Super content, thank you!
your channel is so great!
I really like your channel man
Great video! YOU ROCK!!
I liked your video but can you please use only one system? For example use only metric and have the imperial conversion in a corner of the screen, OR use only imperial and have the metric conversion in the corner of the screen? You started using Metric and having an imperial conversion beneath them. But then you suddenly switched to imperial with no metric conversion. It would be nice since except for USA nobody knows how much a Gallon or a PSI is, so the numbers are meaningless.
I can remember the first space launch when I was very young. I have always dreamed about space flight but I am now in my 70s. My space flight days have passed my by but I can always dream of it. 😎😇 I enjoyed seeing all news stories of new explosions in space.
thanks for the info
I love such documentaries
I was literally waiting for this my whole life :D
Good Explanation.
really well explained, to the point
Friends
great piece...tks
Hi ! Great video as always However I noticed that, unlike in most of you other videos, you left out the conversion to metric units for volumes or pressures (see 4:20 e.g) It would be nice for future videos if you could include these units (as you did for temperature at 5:46) as they speak a lot more to people outside the US. Otherwise great topic, and very well explained and illustrated ;)
Most informative! Excellent presentation of a topic that gets so little attention by us space-nerds.
Until Artemis fuelled up, and then everyone got curious.
I think that a big part of this that you missed was the cost of the other consumables. While the Falcon 9 does indeed use a lot of Kerosene that can't be produced sustainably, it also requires hydrazine and a lot of helium which are expensive. Musk noted in a tweet that Starship will be much cheaper to fill because of that. starship will use methane/oxygen for rcs and will also recycle it to keep the tanks pressurized. I believe that ULA is doing the same with the ACES stage on Vulcan. With the cancellation of ACES and the statement that almost all of the objectives were achieved save for the piston engine powerplant, I'm not sure of Vulcan has achieved that or not.
Muchas gracias por tus videos, son excelentes! Saludos desde Argentina.
Much gusto desde texas!
@@Matt-yp4iz saludos para allá! ❤️
Friends
As usual, your transition from content to ads is seamless. And I watch it all out of respect because your content is excellent. Musk says it's a 1 in 3 chances of a complete success on SN8 (snate). A lot can go wrong. So, we'll see.
He´s crazy!
Love your channel
Holy shit. I've always wondered this!
what r u doing ? aerospace engineer ?
Fantastic video, getting these basics right is critical to achieve SpaceX final goal of Mars colonisation.
Excellent. Thanks.
GREAT VIDEO!
Good explanation
Thanks you great information
I cannot wait to see the belly flop maneuver live
Good information TQ 👍
Would love to be a production technician at their liquid oxygen plant. I would leave my current plant in a heartbeat.
wow nice video!
This is a fabulous level of detail. Thank you.
I know about the oxidizer if anyone wants to know it’s a compony called linden who has a large onsite production facility and 39a and boca chika(idk how to spell it )
If you're on KZhead, you can use Google to check your spelling.
Nice subject
I'm waiting for the 15km flight. Look for schedule every day
It's now confirmed. Monday at the earliest, but weather forecast makes that unlikely. Tuesday most likely and then back ups on Wednesday and the following Monday
Friends
SN8 test completed. All was successful except fuel header tank pressure.
I wonder if the methane that SpaceX buys has the artificial odorant added or not? I'm sure there are leak detectors throughout the site so it's not needed for that purpose, though I doubt it would have any impact on engine performance (or cost much if anything to have it added). I've seen methane tanker trucks on US highways that specify "Odorant added" which implies (to me at least) that there might be tankers out there without it?
Good video and very interesting ✅
Indeed it’s very interesting.. where are you from?
I can’t wait to see their offshore platforms for star ship. I wonder if he will situate them right at the wellhead. Pump natural gas straight from the ground into the platforms storage tanks. There are natural gas powered generators that he could use to create his own O2 as well. Can’t get more efficient than that. A launch pad that creates, processes and stores it’s own fuel…
I dont remember sobbing to this guy but, I still like it
@Joe Cosgrove oh no
@Joe Cosgrove space does exist , trust me,
@Joe Cosgrove if space doesn't exist, then where is earth?
Guys watch out for fuel delivery at Boca Chica for SN-8.
So, the propellent created on Mars will come from water ice and CO2 in the atmosphere (CO2 is most of the atmosphere). I'm not sure where the "Methane from the atmosphere" part came from as any Methane in the atmosphere is so trace that it basically isn't there- if there is any at all. Electrolysis is the process of separating compounds into component elements by running a current through them, so that is what is used to separate water into oxygen and hydrogen. As we should all know, you can't just magically pull Hydrogen out of nowhere to synthesize Methane, so that comes from water (in the current plan. If there isn't enough water ice, we will have to ship elemental Hydrogen to Mars for this propellent synthesis). The Sabatier Reaction or Process is used to synthesize Methane from Hydrogen and CO2. You put them in a pot, crank up the heat, and apply a bunch of pressure to get Methane with water. Just wanted to clear this up for anyone interested in the actual process SpaceX is planning on using for ISRU.
What happens to the loaded fuel when the launch is scrubbed? Is it collected back or just let it vaporize into atmosphere?
Actually, we haven't seen such spectacular price drop. Though stopping price escalation is achievement on its own.
wow amazing
Woah cool
There is (almost I think) no methane in the martian atmosphere, SpaceX will make methane on mars using what is called: the "Sabatier process". In this process, SpaceX will take the *CO2* in the martian atmosphere, and separate it into carbon and oxygen, and will take the water ice from mars (H2O) and separate it into hydrogen and oxygen using electrolysis. They will take four hydrogen atoms with one carbon atom (obviously it won't be one molecule at a time), and create CH4, or methane. The leftover oxygen they can use for breathing, or for oxidizer. Using the resources you find at your destination is called: "In Situ Resource Utilization" or "ISRU". Just a small clarification about the video.
All very nice !!! But wait until something goes wrong ? And it will, In a very big way.. 💥💥🔥🔥🚀
Do fuel suppliers add an Odorizer like what is added to Natural Gas to let crews know if there is a leak? Both LOX and Liquid Methane are colorless and odorless.
Slight nitpick: Lox is technically an oxidizer, not a fuel. However, both fuels and oxidizers are _propellants_.
RP1 is NOT Jet A. It's a highly refined Kerosene blend that includes additives to prevent it from gelling in a cryogenic environment. Plus lubricity for the pumps and valving, to ensure none seize up while in operation. Other chemicals like sulfur and aromatics are removed or minimized, as they react poorly to certain metals in the engine assembly and make a poor lubricant in a high temperature environment. In the end, RP1 is twice as expensive compared to straight-run Kerosene. Some have tried Diesel blends and didn't get very far. Dr Goddard's first rockets used Gasoline.
2:47 The methane concentration in the Martian atmosphere is only a few parts per billion. To collect enough Methane to refill a starship, you would have to condense a significant fraction of the whole martian atmosphere. Instead one would use CO2 and water to produce methane. The martian atmosphere is more than 90% CO2
I thought the fuel was more refined to cut down on some specific hydro carbon chains to help lower the amount of carbon buildup in the turbo pump? Could be wrong
cant wait for starship to launch all the way into orbit... itll be cool to see what it can do
Amazon Prime shipped directly from closeby local store and with free shipping.
Since there in Texas should of used propane, I know of a guy in Arlen, Texas he would of loved to sell them propane and propane accessories.
This Guy is really working on SpaceX
Question: when they have to abandon a launch because of the weather for example and launch on a different day, can they reuse the same fuel or do they have to spend another $150k on a new batch? Thanks, Hans.
@@j1b00m7 With respect I'm looking for an answer from somebody who actually knows not from someone who's just guessing. I could do that myself. Regards, Hans
@@_Super_Hans_ they would recycle the fuel (RP1/Methane) back to the tank farm. At Kennedy they might be able to recycle oxygen, but at Boca Chica it’s probably mostly vented out. The fuel is important to recycle because venting out methane/RP1 is bad for the environment, and the FAA performs assessments to limit the environmental footprint of launch operations. Additionally, they don’t want to leave an explosive combinations of liquids pressurized in the rocket for prolonged times for safety and so they can inspect the rocket if there’s a problem. Also, they super chill their liquids, and the fuel is coldest immediately after fueling, so SpaceX will always do a fresh fueling for each and every launch or test. And finally, leaving the fuels in the rocket will lead to constant boil off, to avoid blowing up they have to vent excess pressure, so you’re constantly wasting fuel by leaving it in the rocket. The cheapest and safest way would be to simply empty the rocket back into the tank farm, and refuel when it’s time to launch.
@@j1b00m7 The F9 fuel is cooled for densification. It gets detanked along with the LOx. The densification is important for performance which is why Falcon 9s will scrub if a delay occurs after T-38 minutes when propellant loading starts.
Happy Thanksgiving to all reading this!
It’s only thanksgiving in the US but thanks.
Using metric for distances and temperatures is great but wtf happened to volumes and pressures?
SpaceX isn't doing any type of Mars mission alone, I'll say that. Having a rocket big enough to get to Mars is a small step. They'll probably do test flights around the moon, have to create and rehearse a complex mid-orbit refueling...then preparing for ~6 months of transit, habitation, weather, dust, supplies, emergency plans, refueling in Mars orbit and launching off Mars... A lot of challenges. SpaceX is not a rover or habitat company (yet) so you can imagine the outside partners and NASA involvement to pull something like this together.
Makes sense, I imagine they'll be the transportation company for nasa in this scenario.
its still not even cold yet in the rgv, and its winter
I hope they're using a counter-current flow system to recover the heat -- er, the cold
I love your videos
Same here .. where are you from ?
🇺🇸 USA
compressing air to 100 PSI alone does nothing for liquefying it , it also needs to be cooled ALOT !
SpaceX is in the perfect place to test solar power from orbit as they are setting up right next to water so a great place to setup the collection antenna giving them a great source of renewable energy to run a water cracking plant from.
Easy! *the shop*
Thanks has new video😊😊
Wonderful 🎈
Since power generation will definitely come before any sort of fuel production on mars, a lot hinges on upcoming rechargeable battery tech breakthroughs which Tesla and other companies are now working on.
instead of electrolysis we can use radiolysis of the co2 in the martian atmosphere to produce carbon and oxygen using radiation butno electricty if we use the decay of radioisotopes.
thanks to you phase one may commence 😈
Hi, can you provide sources for the information in the video?
The whole intro sounds magnanimous but it's either talking specifically about SpaceX or it's referencing a space landscape that only exists because SpaceX paved the way. It's pretty much the same thing you'd get if somebody tried to frame the electric vehicle landscape as "competitive", or self-driving vehicles for that matter. Somebody came along and made it freaking _work_ (not just dipping their toe in the water), and now that people fully understand it's not merely possible but inevitable, they're scrambling to catch up. That's the real legacy. They wouldn't even be trying, without somebody making it happen first.
When rocket fuel is cheaper than gasoline, bruh...
The methane on mars will not be made by taking methane from the athmosphere. It will be made using Co2 athmosphere and extracted water in a process called the sabatier process. The methane observed in the martian athmosphere is miniscule and can not be extracted directly. Co2 however is readily available. You are mentioning the sabatier process in the context of creating oxygen on mars. Which is not the case
Where did that clip of the diggers on Mars (I'm assuming in-situ fuel production) come from?
2:35
Wow I didn't even notice it has the source right on that clip. I'm a dumbass But here it is: kzhead.info/sun/dK2reJRphWt3pn0/bejne.html
threy should use electro magnets and propel spacecrafts into space that way you can line up a series of electromagnet rings and as the object passes through each ring the strength increases til its moving at the speed you want , especially in outer space, then you can go to anywhere in the universe and come back
Wait. I don’t recall there being enough CH4 in Mars’ atmosphere to just pull it out of the air. I thought the Sebatier process was all but required to get enough methane for fuel.
Fact check: The Sabatier Process is not the production of oxygen from water, but the production of Methane from Hydrogen and Carbon Dioxide. The Hydrogen used for the Sabatier Process is usually obtained by Electrolysis of Water, which also produces oxygen.