It's hard to picture just how much payload will be needed to fill all the rockets going to space soon.

We have been brought up with a space view that sees a rocket heading up every once in a while. Even with more frequent launches, these rockets have carried small payloads. In the near future, there is going to be a lot of rockets going to space.

Not only that, they are getting bigger, are able to carry more payload, and will launch multiple times per week. This means there is a lot of mass to orbit required to fill them up.

Where will this come from?

This has serious implications for space logistics.

The Scale of Starship Production

SpaceX alone is creating two Starship production factories and plans to create as many as one Starship per day.

Even at only a 100-ton payload capacity, and without taking into account reusability, that's still around 350 Starships times 100 tons, which is 35,000 tons of cargo per year.

To put this in perspective, current and near-future space missions have operated with payloads averaging around 3,370 kg for dedicated customer LEO launches, which is only about 19% of Starship's capacity in reusable mode.

Even with plans for mega-constellations like Starlink or other satellite networks, the demand for such large payloads doesn't meet the supply that Starship's production could offer.

Not counting Starlink, the total mass to orbit in 2024 was 400 metric tons. Which means only 2 to 4 Starships were all that was needed to meet this demand.

So what will go into the other 364 Starships?

Next . . .

In Part 2, will look how much payload is needed for the Moon and Mars missions.