Space Exploration Technologies Corp.
(NASDAQ:SPCX) CEO Elon Musk said in a post on X on Sunday that a future where solar energy is captured in orbit could push economics away from dollars and toward a system that prices scarcity in energy and mass.
He also argued that SpaceX’s ambitions include orbital computing hardware such as the AI1 satellite with a 150 kW solar array and a 70-meter wingspan, a vision outlined alongside SpaceX will be worth more than Earth if its goals are met.
Musk framed energy and mass as distinct real-world constraints even though physics links them, adding that the solar system contains only a small share of non-solar atoms for building.
I say both energy and mass, as they are separate scarcities for practical purposes, despite being technically "equivalent", as described by Einstein’s famous equation.Our solar system has only a tiny percentage of non-solar atoms with which to build things.— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 12, 2026 Why Musk Sees Energy As The Economy's Future Musk’s argument starts with scale: he said human civilization uses far less than a trillionth of the Sun’s output, implying that tapping even a sliver in space would dwarf today’s activity.
