Source Review: Interesting Engineering — Musk lunar mass driver
Verdict: Mixed Confidence: medium
Trade-press coverage of Musk's March 2026 lunar mass-driver and TERAFAB statements. The article reports Musk's verbatim X/Twitter quote ("Mass drivers on the Moon!"), confirms the 500-1000 TW/yr AI-satellite figure from the February 2, 2026 written update, and surfaces the load-bearing critique that the implied buildup would require approximately 135 Starship launches per day at petawatt scale. The Musk quotes themselves are factually well-attributed; the substantive scale critique (135/day) is the most useful contribution and is consistent with our analysis that the petawatt-scale framing lies outside any non-TAI regime. The article does not endorse Musk's framing; it presents it alongside the scale critique without resolution. Useful as the trade-press container for figure-musk quotes and a canonical landing place for the scale-implausibility critique. No direct conflict with higher-tier sources because the article does not itself make engineering claims — it reports both Musk's framing and the critique.