Yeah, that video is something of a mixed bag. I checked one of the key points the author mentioned, and he's wrong. He says that the payload fraction of rockets is important (correct) and that it's 1% - wrong. See this:
Payload fraction - Wikipedia
which shows payloads in the 2% to 5% range. It may not look like a big difference, but it is. I don't have time to dox every claim in the video, and I'm neither a Musk fanboy, nor a victim of Musk derangement syndrome, so let's just consider some numbers and facts, rather than getting into personalities.
1) SpaceX had terrible problems at the beginning, with three consecutive failures. The fourth, successful, launch saved the company. Since then, it has progressively developed the Falcon 9 (and Heavy), increasing payload, reusability and reliability. According to a NASA parametric cost engineering analysis, SpaceX develops launch vehicles at 10% of the cost of legacy contractors, such as Boeing or Lockheed.
2) The payload-to-fuel mass ratio to put payload into orbit is about 20:1. Starship uses purified natural gas (methane) and liquid oxygen in a 1:4 ratio. So you need 16kg of liquid oxygen and 4 kgs of methane to put 1kg of payload into orbit. Liquid oxygen costs about $0.20 per kg, and methane about $1.35 per kg. So the propellant cost to put 1 kg of payload into orbit is about $10. That's about $1.2M for the 125 tonne payload of Starship. But that's just fuel.
3) There are many other costs, and it gets hazier here. But, for comparison purposes, fuel constitutes about 20% of the total cost of running an airline. So if the same ratio is applied to Starship, then the cost per launch would be about $6M, some distance from the $2M under discussion. And of course getting to orbit is trickier than flying, so this is a flattering ratio. Let's then use a 10% fuel/total cost ratio. This would result in $12M per launch or $100 per kg. This compares to about $2,000 per kg for the Falcon Heavy (compare to $50,000 per kg for the Space Shuttle).
4) I can't see a path to $2M, but a further "mere" 20-fold reduction in launch costs over Falcon Heavy (and a remarkable 500-fold reduction compared to the space shuttle), should be enough to open up Earth orbit to many more uses.
www.nasaspaceflight.com
www.reuters.com
