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SCP-3181 Safe ~ medium confidence
SCP-3181
Expected annual
$1.0M
One-time setup
$608K
Annual recurring
$994K
Personnel
10
First-year capital costs are approximately $608,500 driven primarily by property acquisition, remodeling, and contingency; annual recurring costs are approximately $994,500 driven mainly by personnel (research + monitoring) and ongoing research/operational expenses.
🏗️ One-Time Capital Costs Total: $608K
Facilities $460K
[#1, #2] Purchase of building (mid-range $400k + $10k closing) and exterior remodeling to achieve SEP index 0.1 (~$50k).
Equipment $78K
[#3, #4, #5, #12, #25] Physical security hardware (~$12k), remote surveillance install (~$12k), on-site edge server (~$10k), optional on-prem GPU rig (~$30k), and energy redundancy purchase (UPS + generator ~ $14k).
Contingency Fund $50K
[#22] Establishment of an emergency/contingency reserve for unforeseen incidents (~$50k).
Initial Research And Lab Setup $10K
[#14] Initial animal acquisition/kenneling/aviary modifications and setup costs (~$10k).
Legal Permit Fees $5K
[#18] One-time permit/legal fees and initial filings (~$5k).
Cover Setup $4K
[#19] One-time setup for cover operation / fake business front (web/initial materials) (~$4k).
Archival Cold Storage Purchase $2K
[#24] Purchase of initial offline cold storage media (LTO/air-gapped drives) (~$1.5k).
🔄 Annual Recurring Costs Total: $994K/yr
Staff Wages $680K/yr
[#7, #8, #9, #10] Surveillance operators (~$100k), security guard/on-call (~$50k), research team salaries (~$450k), IT/data engineer (~$80k).
Research And Monitoring $172K/yr
[#11, #12, #13, #21, #23, #24] Cloud storage/backups (~$12k), compute/GPU cloud training (~$15k), human subject testing (~$25k), staff training (~$20k), long-term research program (~$100k), archival refresh (~$0.5k).
Facilities Maintenance $55K/yr
[#6, #16, #17, #25] Remote monitoring office rent and utilities (~$36k), building utilities & maintenance (~$8k), property tax & insurance (~$10k), energy redundancy maintenance (~$1k).
Cover Story And Legal $54K/yr
[#18, #19, #20] Ongoing legal retainer / permit management (~$12k), cover operation recurring costs (~$30k), PR/reputation management (~$12k).
Supplies And Consumables $30K/yr
[#14, #15] Annual animal care and veterinary (~$20k) and experimental consumables/props (~$10k).
Community Mitigation $3K/yr
[#26] Miscellaneous local goodwill/community mitigation (~$3k/yr).
Logistics And Transport $0/yr
[]
⚡ Cost Scenarios
📊 Baseline (baseline) $994K/yr
88.0% probability / year
Normal uneventful year with routine operations, monitoring, research, and cover maintenance.
no incidents routine research progress regular maintenance
🚨 Minor Incident $1.0M/yr
8.0% probability / year +$25K vs baseline
Vandalism, trespass, or minor breach requiring repairs, limited legal action, and short-term PR response.
trespass/vandalism localized damage small legal/repair bills
🚨 Major Breach Media Exposure $1.2M/yr
3.0% probability / year +$200K vs baseline
Significant public exposure or high-profile breach requiring large legal/PR response, potential relocation costs, and incident investigation.
viral social media exposure major trespass requiring relocation or major legal settlement
🚨 Research Breakthrough Requiring Scale Up $1.0M/yr
1.0% probability / year +$50K vs baseline
Research produces compelling results that require rapid scale-up of compute, data collection, or personnel.
major research finding need for expanded compute or hires expanded data collection
👥 Personnel 10 total
Role Count Notes
Security / Surveillance Operator 2 [#7] Two monitoring operators to provide 24/7 feed observation and logging.
Security Officer / Guard 1 [#8] One FTE guard or on-call contract for physical inspections and escorts.
Research Lead / Principal Investigator 1 [#9] PI/senior researcher overseeing the research program.
Research Scientist 2 [#9] Research scientists conducting experiments and analysis.
Research Technician 2 [#9] Technicians supporting experiments, data collection, and animal handling.
Animal Handler 1 [#9, #14] Dedicated handler for conditioning studies with animals.
IT / Systems Engineer 1 [#10] IT/admin to maintain streaming, edge node, backups, and data security.
📋 Confidence Notes
Estimates are based directly on analyst-provided ranges and mid-point selections; some items (property price, optional on-prem hardware, contingency sizing, and staffing mixes) are market-dependent and chosen as reasonable midpoints, producing moderate uncertainty.
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