this post was submitted on 13 May 2026
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Don't they put plutonium reactors in space? Have to be able to cool those somehow? Or maybe they are not difficult to cool... I know I have seen pretty massive heat fin stacks on satellites.
Honestly if they are hyper focused on putting data centers SOMEWHERE this seems like a less bad option... Maybe I'm missing the bigger picture somehow.
The ones that power spacecraft generate less than 5000W of heat at max power (while producing 300W of usable electricity).
In order to power a single server rack of 72 Blackwell GPUs, which takes about 130,000 watts, you'd need about 430 of those RTGs, and need to manage cooling requirements of 430 times as much (plus however much additional power will be required by the cooling system itself, too).
The entire point of those is to produce heat to power a thermoelectric generator. And while most of the heat will be wasted, it is a rather small amount overall.
A data centre would require massive amounts of energy, most likely provided by solar panel arrays. Then the processors will convert all the energy to heat that has to go somewhere.
I don't know the math or the physics, purely speculation and good faith discussion (sorry if I offended anyone by being tepidly in favor of this option lol).
I don't disagree with your premise that it will be quite the feat, but I doubt they would be broadcasting the headline unless they thought they had a way to make the math, math.
Have you never heard of Elon before?
Bro, Elmo runs SpaceX and Tesla has been talking for over a decade about how FSD is right around the corner, and it's still pretty much trash.
Don't assume these chuds have actually thought shit through just because they are making publicity around it. Silicon Valley is notorious for lying about capabilities to get investor money, and has been for as long as I can remember. If I had a dollar for every full of shit promise I've heard out of these dipshits I could pay for healthcare...
Think about that, though. How much heat does a satellite produce to necessitate large fin stacks? And how much heat does a data center produce?
Honestly not sure about the math, I was just speculating for the sake of discussion, and a belief that this is slightly less harmful to human life than terrestrial solutions.
RTGs do get put out in space, however they aren't used for everything. If a single rocket experiences Spontaneous Unplanned Disassembly while carrying an RTG, it's a disaster that spreads radioactive materials.
The entire point of an RTG is to use the waste heat as power, and if I understand RTG design, the cooling fins are to provide the difference in temperature that thermoelectric modules need to produce power. So there isn't a ton of heat that it gives off in general.
Look at the international space station. It has massive radiator panels, and all it needs to do is house humans and the equipment to keep them alive. A lot of bulkiness of space suits is dedicated to heat management.
The #1 product of data centers is massive amounts of equipment-killing heat. That heat either gets radiated via massive radiator panels, or the space data center cooks it's own equipment.