01:18:04 · Scott Nolan, Ty Morse
[01:18:04] S0: Yeah. When we started the company, the whole AI data center wave was not not really top of mind for people or even for us. We we were just very focused on bringing back capability as quickly as possible. So there wasn't the AI data center boom. There wasn't the Russia ban. It was, we need to do this, and we need to do it for the advanced reactors as quickly as we can so that they can succeed. Now it's become obvious that not only do we need to do that, but we need to massively increase the amount of nuclear fuel produced to power all the reactors that people are working on that the hyperscalers are planning to put at their sites behind the meter. And so it's one of the most urgent things we think about is how do we build for capacity? So right now, as we build enrichment capacity in Kentucky, we're sizing that to completely satisfy the domestic industry all the way through 2040. We want to get way ahead of it and make sure there's more than enough capacity to power this first in decades net meaningful expansion of The US grid. The way we think about it is not just cost. It's not just schedule. It's how do we do these things at scale and allow ourselves to scale up capacity both responsibly as we see the demand coming, so on short timelines, and then in a way that really moves the needle. And so, yeah, that's something we think about constantly. [01:19:25] S1: How did that change the way that you think about building the company and your need to go produce way more uranium?
01:19:25 · Ty Morse, Scott Nolan
[01:19:25] S1: How did that change the way that you think about building the company and your need to go produce way more uranium? [01:19:32] S0: The the AI boom makes it even more obvious how quickly we need to expand grid capacity. So if we go back to something I said earlier, it's 2010. The US and China were exactly at the same place on the grid. Today, they've doubled it. So in about fifteen years, it is the case that if you really want to, you can double your grid from where we're sitting today. And then if you look at the AI demand, it's dramatic. It's like by 2030, I believe the AI... The latest projections are that the AI data center demand for electricity is gonna completely consume or equal today's A [01:20:09] S1: eclipse, yeah.
01:20:09 · Ty Morse, Scott Nolan
[01:20:09] S1: eclipse, yeah. [01:20:10] S0: Yeah. And so clearly, we do need to double. Can we double by 2030? I think that's a big feat. But what all the data centers are planning is, Okay, bringing new transmission online that quickly and going for centralized nuclear plants is going to be too hard. We're going to go behind the meter. And so they're going to bring their own power. They're going to be deploying SMRs. I think we see that really ramp in the 2030s. It'll take a couple of years before they're through licensing and really scaling, but we're planning for ramping in the 2030s. And so as we think ahead to how are we doing things, everything that we're doing is designed to scale. So how do we unlock things like mass manufacturing, all the progress in the last, really, thirty plus years since anyone has completely re architected enrichment? How do we leverage all those things along with the supply chains for them to unlock rapid scaling next decade once we're online. [01:21:04] S1: Do you have any really great stories from working at SpaceX that kind of shifted the way that you think?
01:21:10 · Scott Nolan
[01:21:10] S0: You know, to to your question on schedule and how do you drive schedule, the dimensions I mentioned were, you know, put things in parallel that can be put in parallel, question your granularity on timelines, make decisions without belaboring them. Once you're at a pretty good level of confidence, move forward. I think the fourth dimension that may be very hard for people to do sometimes is don't beat your head against the wall. If you're working on something and it's just a huge roadblock to the question of make a decision when you're pretty confident, Also, don't be afraid to go back and make a different decision. And so early days when I was there of working on the Merlin engine system alongside some incredible people, just as a kid out of school, a couple years out of school, I was working on a lot of the structural thermal analysis and design around those engine systems. And I remember one night, at the time, we had an ablative chamber. And an ablative chamber is basically a composite wrapped chamber that burns away as you operate the rocket, as you operate the engine. And so this ablative chamber was having a few issues. We were operating at probably higher pressures and temperatures than most ablatives had been run previously. They've been proven extremely reliable and low cost before. But we were running into these persistent issues with them. And late one night, a few people, you know, had gotten together to talk about this. And I remember the question came up, like, what if what if we just switch? Like, what if this is if this is a fool's errand to get this ablative working at the thrust levels we need, at the pressures and temperatures we need? What if we what if we just bite the bullet and go as fast as we can rethinking this, accepting that maybe this was not the right path, and going to a regeneratively cooled all metal engine? And that's what we did. And, now, obviously, the Merlin engine and Raptor engines work this way, none that SpaceX flies are ablative engines. And so one lesson I learned was, yeah, try and move fast. Try and make the right decisions. Don't make irreversible decisions, but also don't get completely stuck. And if you're just going down a path that doesn't feel like it's going anywhere, don't have ego around it, like, even enforce a meritocracy in your own mind and just go back.
01:23:42 · Scott Nolan
And, yes, there's gonna be some moving targets. Yes, things are going to change. There might be additional work to do that you're hoping to not do. Maybe you've got to take a hit on spend some more money to go fix this. But don't get too hung up on things, and don't have any sort of sacred ideas that you cannot question. Question everything, question requirements, question the path, and just try and find the best path forward at all times while obviously trying to somewhat minimize chaos. And so, yeah, this almost gets back to the founder question that you asked before. Inside a company, when there's big changes and big shifts in direction in response to new information, it's going to mean people have to do more work. And ideally, that wouldn't be the case. But sometimes the right path is to change and adjust. And I think, yeah, it can take someone who really has the big picture in mind, whether that's a founder who might be the CEO or a founder who's not the CEO, really saying, hey, let's think more about why we're doing this. We've all been going down this path together, but it's okay to change direction. And that was a lesson that I wouldn't have expected to learn, especially given SpaceX being so known for just the classic things, fast schedule, hard charging, cost. But sometimes you have to actually go back and and and change the way you're doing stuff.
01:25:11 · Ty Morse
[01:25:11] S1: So Another thing that I've heard consistently is that Elon will make decisions, like, think through a problem and make decisions that no one else kind of sees, and then it seems like a really hard... Like, the wrong decision short term. And then later on, maybe even a year or two later, it becomes the right decision. Was there any moment at SpaceX where you saw Elon make a call that everyone else thought was wrong that ended up being right?