Space Logistics: The Final Frontier

The world’s head seems to be spinning over billionaire-eccentric Elon Musk’s recent purchase of the social media conglomerate Twitter and subsequent his refusal to testify on behalf of Amber Heard in the highly publicized Johnny Depp defamation trial. However, digging through all the current Musk-related news, you may come across some recent moves being made in the background that could change the logistics industry forever. 

We’ve conquered land, sea, and air… but are we ready for space?

Space X, a company owned and founded by Elon Musk in 2002, is paving the way for aerospace ingenuity and spacecraft construction in the 21st century. Astronauts, such as the Crew-3 mission, have been launching into the sky and returning to Earth, signaling that “the new frontier “is back in on the map. 

Space X also operates Starlink, a “high-speed, low latency broadband network” that provides internet across the world. It requires a clear view of the sky to connect and serves as an ideal service provider for rural and remote communities. (Yes, you too can access the highly marketable internet provider - on a first-come, first-served basis of course.) Starlink made headline news ten weeks ago when Elon Musk offered the service to those living in Ukraine while in the throes of the Russian invasion. Today, with 10,000 terminals now set up by the company, its satellites are connected to the users on the ground. Currently, the service is being used by 150,000 daily users in Ukraine, offering a connection to the world wide web. Starlink has also now collaborated with Hawaiian Airlines, offering free wifi to passengers on the long-haul flights across the Pacific Ocean to-and-from the island chain, beginning next year. 

All this talk about Elon Musk, his companies, and his space obsession had the team at iLevel thinking that…

… he seems pretty serious.  

The normalization of space travel has been at the forefront of the public’s imagination, notably at the behest of some of the most famous fiction writers –Edgar Rice Burrough’s John Carter and George Lucas’s Star Wars come to mind.

However, Elon Musk has now taken it a step further than hardcover novels and the big screen. His goal to colonize Mars by landing people on the planet by 2026 has been repeated over and over again. He says that he is confident Space X will send humans to the surface of our red neighboring planet by that time – in fact, he believes there will be a city of one million people on Mars by 2050.

And as it turns out… he is putting his money where his mouth is.

With that 2026 date around the corner and Space X showing no signs of slowing down, what could the future of logistics look like when over-the-road trucking, railroads, and steamship lines are no longer the only players in the game? Will fleets soon include rockets? Will they be part of the “all-electric” gang? 

So, let’s talk logistics.

How would we get people to Mars? Space X has an answer to that. The company’s Starship rocket is the first step in what they aim to become a full fleet. The company is even warning NASA that they should prepare for maximum capacity for the inaugural launch to Mars. 

However, once humans arrive, they will need to immediately deal with higher levels of radiation (much higher than we consider safe on earth).  The new colonists would need to be housed in underground tubes or heavily-shielded areas in low-elevation valleys. That’s a lot of construction equipment and material needed to get the ball rolling.

Additionally, there is the question of consumables. Food and water are at the top of the priority list when it comes to sustaining life. The International Space Station already has proven that urine and sweat can be used for drinking water, but the amount needed to sustain a colony would require heavy lifting from some robotic friends. Robots can dig down into the soil and extract water from the planet – Mars used to have oceans, after all. These robots would need to be transported along with any replacement parts, repair equipment, and additional manufacturing material to make more robots. 

And this is just the beginning… imagine supplying goods for a city of one million people!

The Bottom Line

Elon Musk’s Space X is leading the charge alongside several major names in the space exploration realm - such as Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin and Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic. But capitalism suggests that there will not be a monopoly on shipping both goods and people to space. The year 2026 is right around the corner – if Elon’s goal of a Mars landing is successful, we can expect companies with similar endeavors to follow in his wake. New territory does equal dollar signs, after all.

And just think… Mars is just the beginning, but SPACE is the “Final Frontier”…

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