: From what I gather, the cost of the PoA taking off from Reach would be so
: astronomically huge, that I think we can say it's not canon again, since
: it's kind of impossible. Do you want to weigh in Stephen?

That's based on modern-day low earth orbit prices, which is to say "how much does it cost to duct tape this to a Russian rocket designed in the 1960's?"

Granted, the energy demands are ridiculously huge no matter how you slice it. Given the mass of the Infinity that he gave, getting the ship into low-Earth orbit from Earth's surface would require a few kilograms worth of energy, i.e. you'd have to annhilate about 1.7kg antimatter with 1.7kg of matter to do it even if your engine operated at perfect efficiency.

Applying realistic logic to the Haloverse is just generally a bad idea, though. MAC platforms? MAC platforms.