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SCP-981 Safe ~ medium confidence
SCP-981
Expected annual
$433K
One-time setup
$545K
Annual recurring
$425K
Personnel
6
One-time capital and containment upgrades (~$545k) are the primary upfront costs (vault, suppression, HVAC, specialized equipment and a contingency fund); recurring annual costs (~$425k/yr) are driven mainly by security and specialist staff, research activity, hazardous-disposal and administrative overhead.
🏗️ One-Time Capital Costs Total: $545K
Contingency Fund $250K
[#19] One-time incident remediation / containment breach reserve fund (recommended one-time capital reserve).
Facilities $177K
[#2, #3, #10, #23] Vault retrofit or dedicated nitrate-safe vault, fire-suppression upgrades, cleared-room setup (room prep and sweep tools), and incremental vault/space costs for separation of components.
Equipment $48K
[#1, #4, #7, #9, #13] Custom copper storage box, environmental-control hardware installation, access-control hardware/CCTV purchase & integration, nitrate-safe transport containers, and one-time digital-forensics hardware (workstation/degausser/shredder).
Initial Research And Lab Setup $31K
[#8, #11, #18, #21] Initial specialist training, controlled-experiment equipment and quarantined test media, a budgeted single duplication/reformatting attempt (per-attempt cost baseline), and an initial external audit/verification.
Legal Cover One Time $25K
[#16] One-time legal fees / purchase/settlement / provenance sanitization costs for contested acquisitions or initial legal actions.
Seizure Operation $9K
[#20] Initial seizure/transportation operation costs (per-operation budget for future recoveries).
Hazmat Drill Setup $5K
[#15] Initial hazmat/emergency-response drill and setup costs (one-time exercise equipment and coordination).
🔄 Annual Recurring Costs Total: $425K/yr
Staff Wages $300K/yr
[#6, #8, #13, #17] Security staff (3 FTE), film archivist/handler (1 FTE), digital-forensics analyst labor, and research staffing (1 FTE researcher).
Administrative Overhead $55K/yr
[#22] Administrative, HR, procurement, insurance and facility-allocation overhead (~15% applied to direct recurring budget).
Hazardous Disposal $20K/yr
[#12] Quarantine storage and hazardous-waste handling / incineration / chain-of-custody costs for contaminated media.
Emergency Response Retainer $15K/yr
[#15] Hazmat/emergency-response team retainer and periodic drills (recurring contract costs).
Cover Story And Legal $10K/yr
[#16] Ongoing liaison, cover-story maintenance, legal retainers and cultural-institution relations.
Supplies And Consumables $9K/yr
[#11, #14] Per-experiment consumables/quarantined test media and PPE / archival consumables (gloves, cleaning solutions, sleeves, humidity cards, disposable tools).
Research And Monitoring $5K/yr
[#21] Record-keeping, database licensing/backups, periodic audits and monitoring overhead (recurring portion).
Facilities Maintenance $4K/yr
[#5, #23] Ongoing energy to run HVAC/dehumidification, sensor maintenance, calibration, filter replacement, and incremental vault monitoring costs.
Logistics And Transport $4K/yr
[#9] Secure courier / per-move transport costs averaged annually (DOT-compliant transport of nitrate media).
Access Control Monitoring $2K/yr
[#7] Recurring CCTV storage, remote monitoring and access-log retention costs.
⚡ Cost Scenarios
📊 Baseline (baseline) $425K/yr
94.0% probability / year
Normal uneventful year with standard containment operations, routine experiments and no containment incidents.
routine_handling scheduled_experiments no_incidents
🚨 Minor Incident $475K/yr
5.0% probability / year +$50K vs baseline
Localized contamination or a single altered secondary medium escapes internal testing and requires quarantine, hazardous disposal, and legal follow-up.
contaminated_secondary_media single-site_quarantine hazardous_disposal
🚨 Major Breach $925K/yr
1.0% probability / year +$500K vs baseline
Public exposure or spread of altered media to external archives/online repositories requiring mass remediation, legal settlements and extended forensic response.
public_exposure mass_remediation legal_settlements
👥 Personnel 6 total
Role Count Notes
Security Officer / MTF Agent 3 [#6] 24/7 coverage, three full-time equivalents to staff shifts and provide access control.
Research Scientist 1 [#17] Dedicated researcher/anomaly specialist to run controlled tests and manage analysis.
Research Assistant / Film Archivist 1 [#8] Trained film handler/archivist (0.5–1.0 FTE equivalent budgeted as 1 FTE in staffing).
Digital Forensics Analyst 1 [#13] Analyst responsible for air-gapped forensic workstations, media quarantine and forensic processing.
📋 Confidence Notes
Analyst notes are detailed with ranges for nearly every line item, allowing mid-range estimates, but many items (vault retrofit, legal contingency, frequency of experiments/incidents) have wide ranges and depend on site-specific choices; hence medium confidence.
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