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SCP-5520 Unknown ? low confidence
SCP-5520
Expected annual
$67.6M
One-time setup
$1.6B
Annual recurring
$67.1M
Personnel
71
One-time infrastructure, SRA procurement/deployment and catastrophic contingency reserves dominate capital costs (~$1.58B). Recurring costs (~$66.1M/yr) are driven primarily by continuous SRA energy/logistics, security and specialist teams, and ongoing monitoring/maintenance.
🏗️ One-Time Capital Costs Total: $1.6B
Catastrophic Contingency Reserve $1.0B
[#28] Broad catastrophic contingency reserve for worst-case national-level response, evacuations, long-term remediation and ecological mitigation.
Facilities $245.0M
[#2, #4, #5, #7, #10, #23] Site preparation, emplacement/vaults, interior foam-distribution installation, precursor storage tank farms, bulkhead/bulk civil works, underwater/dredging and initial corrosion-resistant materials procurement.
Equipment $178.5M
[#1, #8, #13, #14, #18, #19, #26] SRA procurement/manufacture (production-run assumption), bulkhead operation hardware & remote controls, sensor/monitoring installation, robotic inspection fleet, secure comms hardware, one-time legal/cover payments, and initial containment spares stockpile.
Emergency Remediation Reserve $100.0M
[#20] Reserved cash for emergency remediation, surge operations and post-activation cleanup if SUNDOWN is executed.
Environmental Mitigation $50.0M
[#9] Environmental containment plans, mitigation, specialist contractor engagements, and upfront remediation contingencies for Lake Huron flooding/foam deployment.
Grid Upgrades $5.0M
[#3] One-time grid/generator/UPS upgrades and redundant power provisioning for high-power SRA installations.
Initial Research And Lab Setup $500K
[#15] Structural/modelling compute and initial simulation tooling to support containment planning and SUNDOWN simulations.
🔄 Annual Recurring Costs Total: $67.1M/yr
Logistics And Transport $40.0M/yr
[#3] Continuous high operational energy costs for SRAs (generator/grid/fuel logistics, UPS, cooling) and routine heavy-equipment logistics.
Staff Wages $12.0M/yr
[#11, #12, #25] Loaded year-round wages for perimeter security, specialized SUNDOWN response team, on-call engineers/technicians and core research personnel (loaded estimates include benefits/clearance overhead).
Black Budget Reserve $5.0M/yr
[#21] Annual covert reserve for hush payments, local jurisdiction compensation, and political mitigation (insurance-equivalent).
Facilities Maintenance $3.0M/yr
[#3, #7, #8, #23, #16] Ongoing bulkhead and civil infrastructure maintenance, remote-operation system testing, corrosion-control replacement cycles, and sealed-facility integrity upkeep.
Supplies And Consumables $2.5M/yr
[#6, #26] Foam precursor partial replenishment, chemical handling consumables, pumps/valves/spare parts consumables and periodic resupply.
Research And Monitoring $1.6M/yr
[#13, #14, #15, #24] Ongoing remote-sensing operations/analysis, robotic inspection operations, simulation updates, and secure data storage/archiving.
Cover Story And Legal $1.5M/yr
[#19, #27] Ongoing legal teams, FOIA management, liaison payments, and steady-state misinformation/cover-story budgets.
Medical Support $800K/yr
[#17] Ongoing medical, psychiatric, ethical oversight and specialized remote-study costs related to SCP-5520.
Training And Drills $500K/yr
[#12, #22] Annual certification, SUNDOWN readiness exercises, heavy-equipment drills and inter-department coordination exercises.
Secure Comms Operations $200K/yr
[#18] Operations, maintenance and monitoring of hardened/air-gapped communications systems.
Personnel Overhead Earmark $0/yr
[#25] Personnel benefits/clearance overhead noted in analyst estimates are included in the loaded staff_wages above; earmark set to 0 to avoid double-counting.
⚡ Cost Scenarios
📊 Baseline (baseline) $67.1M/yr
95.8% probability / year
Routine year with no major incidents: ongoing monitoring, security, maintenance and reserves replenished at steady-state.
no_incident steady_monitoring
🚨 Minor Incident $71.1M/yr
4.0% probability / year +$4.0M vs baseline
Localized equipment or seal failure requiring targeted repairs, limited foam refresh, short-term surge staffing and modest PR/legal activity.
sensor_or_valve_failure localized_leak limited_emergency_response
🚨 Major Breach $116.1M/yr
0.2% probability / year +$49.0M vs baseline
Significant containment breach or SRA degradation requiring emergency SRA replacement, large remediation and substantial legal/PR operations.
SRA_failure partial_facility_flooding multi-day_remediation
🚨 Catastrophic Breach $1.1B/yr
0.0% probability / year +$999.0M vs baseline
Large-scale containment failure leading to regional/national emergency response, long-term remediation, evacuation and ecological mitigation.
SUNDOWN_failure uncontrolled_AAF-W_growth regional_ecological_threat
👥 Personnel 71 total
Role Count Notes
Security Officer / MTF Agent 30 Perimeter guards and covert patrols to enforce exclusion zones; loaded costs included in staff_wages. Maps to [#11].
Specialized response team (SUNDOWN crew) 20 Engineers, operators, EOD, ROV pilots and on-call leadership for activation; maps to [#12].
Research Scientist 6 Modeling, analysis, and correspondence research staff; maps to [#15, #17].
Engineer / Maintenance 6 Facility, power, corrosion control and bulkhead maintenance staff; maps to [#3, #23].
Remote Operator / ROV Pilot 4 Robotic inspection and remote mapping operations; maps to [#14, #13].
Administrative Staff 3 Site administration, logistics coordination and FOIA/cover liaison support; maps to [#19].
Medical Officer 1 Medical and psychiatric support for SCP-5520 and staff; maps to [#17].
Site Director / Executive Staff 1 Senior decision-maker / oversight for SUNDOWN authorization; maps to [N/A].
📋 Confidence Notes
High uncertainty in core drivers (whether SRAs already exist, number required, foam seeding status, and civil works scope). Many analyst line items are broad ranges and catastrophic costs are open-ended, so estimates are order-of-magnitude and subject to substantial revision.
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