Elon Musk wants to build a giant catapult on the moon

For years, Elon Musk has talked about colonizing Mars. Now, he's talking about building Looney Tunes contraptions on the moon instead.

The New York Times reported that Musk told employees at xAI on Tuesday evening that he wants to build a factory on the moon to construct AI data center satellites. Not only that, but Musk wants the factory to include some type of gigantic space catapult, called a mass driver, that would then launch the satellites into space, purportedly for the sake of powering xAI's artificial intelligence network.

"You have to go to the moon," Musk reportedly told employees, per the Times.

In case you're wondering why this plan involves xAI and not just SpaceX, it's because the two just recently merged at the corporate level. Musk said that the merger was necessary to help xAI build AI data centers in orbit around the Earth.

While these plans sound like something straight out of science fiction, Musk does have an impressive track record with SpaceX, which has accomplished many engineering firsts.

Of course, Musk did not elaborate on how, exactly, this facility would be built, or on what sort of timeline it would come together. Musk has spent decades talking up the notion of using SpaceX to colonize Mars, but he recently pivoted to the moon instead. Musk often talks about the importance of making the human race interplanetary.

As Mashable has reported previously, Musk has a history of making bold announcements that don't come to fruition.