DDG(X) Next-Generation Destroyer’s Capabilities And Costs Are Solidifying

As the U.S. Navy’s next-generation destroyer, currently dubbed the DDG(X), continues through concept design stages, the service’s surface warfare director reiterated Tuesday how the future ship must be able to field a wider variety of weapons systems, while sporting nearly unprecedented levels of power production. And while questions remain about delivery schedules and cost, the Navy needs to make DDG(X) far more capable of taking on future systems and upgrades than its predecessor, the Arleigh Burke destroyer class, a design that is now officially ‘maxed out’ in terms of future growth.

The Navy has remained largely mum as of late about where the DDG(X) effort currently stands, but Rear Adm. Bill Daly gave an update on the program during the Surface Navy Association’s annual conference, which TWZ attended.

“DDG(X) is a must do, operationally, tactically, for shipbuilding,” Daly said. “The DDG(X) design is our clean-sheet imperative to update warship endurance, power production and storage, C5I [command, control, communication, computer, cyber and intelligence], and weapons technology such as hypersonics and directed energy.”

Daly noted that U.S. households consume 40 percent more power than they did when the lead destroyer in the current destroyer class, USS Arleigh Burke (DDG-51) was built in the late 1980s, and that such consumption has translated to ships as well. As part of this power requirement, he said the Fiscal Year 2025 National Defense Authorization Act calls for the Navy to investigate power systems that can generate 40 megawatts of reserve power.

“This is a required evolution that we must get right for DDG(X), quickly,” he said, adding that the service is proceeding on testing propulsion systems at land-based sites, as required by law. USNI News reported in 2023 that a $122 million, full-scale DDG(X) integrated propulsion system would be tested at the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Philadelphia.

TWZ has in the past reported what the DDG(X)’s so-called Integrated Power System (IPS) will offer:

“IPS will also be vital to meet the increased power generation demands of both directed-energy weapons and powerful sensor arrays. The technology behind IPS is the same as found in the Zumwalt class of destroyers, in which an advanced turbo-electric drive system replaces the traditional gas-turbine propulsion gear. While the Zumwalt class has not proved a success, with only three hulls completed, its propulsion system is unquestionably powerful, putting out more than 75 megawatts of power.”

Daly also suggested that the exact weapons systems aboard DDG(X) remain in the works, but TWZ has reported on how they will likely include long-range surface to air and hypersonic missiles, as well as directed-energy weapons. To date, Zumwalt class are the only Navy surface combatants capable of generating such high levels of electricity and are in the midst of being outfitted with launchers to eventually fire Intermediate-Range Conventional Prompt Strike (IRCPS) hypersonic missiles. Go here to read more TWZ coverage of that effort.

“Every time you watch an impressive video of what meshed drones can do, ask yourself, would I rather have a large-bore shotgun, a directed-energy weapon, or both for the DDG(X)?” Daly said. “That is a required evolution that we need to get correct quickly.”

Asked about when the Navy will release more about the DDG(X), Daly said he wants “to make sure I have several parts right in that shape, and that’s what we’re doing, concept design.”

Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) has not responded to TWZ queries by deadline regarding the evolution of the future warship’s design. But a LinkedIn post last month by the Navy’s Program Executive Office (PEO) Ships about an officer’s going-away party features a photo of DDG(X) on a cake, in which the Mk 45 five-inch main gun is no longer on the bow, a contrast to images released by the Navy of the future ship in the past.

Naval News’ Carter Johnson was the first to report on the main gun’s absence in the DDG(X) cake rendering, which also shows a rearrangement of the Mk41 Vertical Launching System (VLS) missile modules, along with changes to the front-facing bridge windows and other modifications. At this point, it remains unclear whether the cake reflects the ship’s current design or the creative liberty of the cake maker.

Either way, DDG(X) is planned as a bigger ship than its Burke brethren, displacing 13,500 tons, which is nearly 40 percent greater than the 9,700-ton displacement of the latest Flight III Arleigh Burke variant, according to a December Congressional Research Service report.

While DDG(X) will host the Flight III Aegis Combat System and the high-powered AN/SPY-6 radar, also known as the Air and Missile Defense Radar (AMDR) or Enterprise Air Surveillance Radar (EASR), DDG(X) will have more margin for growth than Flight IIIs, which means more space, weight capacity, electrical power and cooling capacity that will allow it to accommodate new higher-power equipment and directed-energy weapons over its service life, the CRS report states.

“[The] DDG 51 Flight (FLT) III [design] is highly capable, but after over 40 years in production and 30 years of upgrades the [DDG-51] hull form does not provide sufficient space and center of gravity margin to host these future capabilities,” Navy officials told CRS.

DDG(X) will also feature reduced infrared, acoustic and underwater electromagnetic signatures, increasing its survivability. It is further expected to have a greater cruising range due to fuel efficiency that will reduce its need for underway refueling. DDG(X) is planned to have an increased weapon capacity compared to its predecessor as well.

“The Navy states that the baseline DDG(X) design, like the Fight III DDG-51 design, is to include 96 standard Vertical Launch System (VLS) cells, with an ability to incorporate 12 large missile launch cells in place of 32 of the 96 standard VLS cells,” the CRS report states. “It is also to include two 21-cell Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM) launchers, and possibly also an ability to be built with an additional mid-body hull section, called the Destroyer Payload Module, that would provide additional payload capacity.”

Still, the Navy’s ambitious plans for DDG(X) are coming with a cost, even as the brass warns that China could move to invade Taiwan in the next few years, according to the CRS. The Navy’s 2025 shipbuilding plan called for production of those ships to commence in 2032, but the Navy later informed the CBO that the first ship actually wouldn’t begin production until 2034 or later. Go here to read more TWZ coverage of how the future DDG fleet in general is being impacted by cost increases and delivery delays.

The Navy wants to eventually buy 28 DDG(X) ships at an average cost of $3.3 billion per vessel, a price “driven mostly by an increase in the size and capabilities” of the future warship, according to the CBO. But given the size and new tech onboard the DDG(X), CBO’s assessment states that those ships will actually cost $4.4 billion on average. The CBO also found that Flight III costs will balloon from an average of $2.1 billion per ship to $2.5 billion per hull, with even steeper cost increases coming in the future.

“The uncertainty about the ultimate size and capabilities of the [DDG(X)] suggests that its final cost could differ substantially from both the Navy’s and CBO’s estimates,” the report states.

As the fleet awaits further details about the DDG(X), all signs point to it being a game-changing platform in comparison to the surface fleet’s current capabilities. But what precisely it will field, and whether the Navy and industry can deliver it on time and within budget, remains to be seen.

Email the author: geoff@twz.com