← T-Minus: Space-Cyber Briefing
T-Minus: Space-Cyber Briefing
The Growing Importance of Spaceports to the World Economy.
01:01:24
A panel of US spaceport representatives converged on Washington DC to explain to lawmakers the growing importance of spaceports to the world economy.
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- [00:02]
Maria Varmazes
You're listening to the N2K space network.
- [00:08]
George Neild
Happy holidays from all of us here at N2K Networks. We're taking some time off to spend with our families and we'll be sharing some of our radio programs and repeat episodes during this time for you to enjoy. We will resume our daily briefing on January 2nd. Happy New Year.
- [00:31]
Rob Long
The IT world used to be simpler. You only had to secure and manage environments that you controlled. Then came new technologies and new ways to work. Now employees, apps and networks are everywhere.
- [00:44]
General Ted Mercer
This means poor visibility, security gaps and added risk.
- [00:48]
Rob Long
That's why Cloudflare created the first ever connectivity cloud.
- [00:53]
General Ted Mercer
Visit cloudflare.com to protect your business everywhere you do business. This.
- [01:03]
George Neild
When most people think of space, they focus on launch and more importantly on the spacecraft. The big shiny rocket or sleek looking spaceplane. And all the work that's gone into engineering. The spacecraft gets all the glory. But what most people don't realize is that there wouldn't be a spacecraft without a spaceport. You can't get to space without the infrastructure needed to support a launch. Welcome to T Minus deep space from N2K Networks. I'm Maria Varmazes. The Global Spaceport alliance hosted a panel of spaceport operators in Washington, D.C. this week to explain to lawmakers the value that their facilities bring to the regions that they serve. They discussed their challenges in establishing a firm foothold in the national economy and called for a clear national spaceport policy that would provide funding for spaceport infrastructure just as we've done for airports, seaports, railways and highways. N2K was able to record the discussion at the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill. The panel was moderated by GSA Chairman Dr. George Neild and included Rob Long, CEO of Space Florida Major General retired Ted Mercer, CEO and Executive Director of the Virginia SPACeport Authority Scott McLaughlin, executive director at Spaceport America and Arturo Machuca, Director of Houston Spaceport.
- [02:57]
General Ted Mercer
My name again is Dr. George Neal and I'm currently serving as the Chairman of the Global Spaceport Alliance. GSA was established back in 2015 with the goal of developing a global network of spaceports that can help to increase access to space and facilitate continued growth of the global space economy. We've got an awesome program today and you'll be hearing from some of the nation's top spaceports, including Rob Long, the CEO of Space Florida General Ted Mercer, CEO and Executive Director of the Virginia SPACeport Authority Scott McLaughlin, executive director of New Mexico Spaceport Authority at Spaceport America and Arturo Machuca, Director of the Houston Spaceport but before we hear from them, I'd like to just sort of step the stage a little bit. Ever since Yuri Gagarin was launched by the Soviet Union more than 60 years ago, almost all of the significant accomplishments and historic milestones that we've seen in space have been by the government. Whether we're Talking about the X15 program, Project Mercury, Project Gemini, the Apollo moon landings, 30 years of flying the space shuttle, or building and living and working on board the International Space Station, it's been the government that has been planning, developing and executing those programs. Going forward. That is not necessarily going to be the case because private industry is playing an increasingly important role. And there's a number of reasons for that, including, if it's done correctly, the potential for lower costs, increased innovation, greater risk tolerance, the opportunity for new products, services, customers and markets, and new sources of funding and investment. And that new philosophy is starting to really show some benefits, especially in the last few years. This is a plot of the number of FAA license launches per year. And of course it used to be just a handful a year. Starting eight years ago, that curve has grown exponentially and there is no indication that that curve is going to turn around or even level off when it comes to spaceports. There are currently 14 FAA licensed spaceports now, and there's more than a dozen over on the left hand column who have announced that they have already submitted their application or they plan to do so in the future. In terms of the global space economy, according to the Space foundation, we're now in excess of $546 billion per year. And what's even more exciting is the fact that there is a very strong consensus right now between all of the economists and financial experts that that global space economy is going to continue to grow at a very rapid pace and will likely exceed a trillion dollars per year or more in just the next 10 to 20 years. We believe that much of that economic growth could take place at or near spaceports. And that's based on our belief that spaceports are not just locations from which launches and reentries occ, but they could also be focal points and technology hubs that can support things like aerospace, manufacturing, research and technology, education and training, workforce development, and in the not too distant future, point to point transportation through space. At the same time, space has become tremendously important for our nation in terms of national security, technological leadership, international competitiveness, and inspiration for students. We also count on space for our everyday activities. Communication, navigation, financial transactions, weather forecasts, growing our food, even entertainment. So things are Pretty good. But there are some challenges. And one of those challenges is the government sometimes struggles to keep pace with industry. Obviously, most US Launches today take place either from the Kennedy Space center in Cape Canaveral or from Vandenberg. And they do an awesome job. And we'll hear more about that later. But think about it. Those are some places where it's quite possible that you would see a hurricane, a wildfire earthquake, a launchpad accident, or even, heaven forbid, a terrorist attack. And if one of those were to take place and cause significant damage, we could not have guaranteed access to space for many months or even years. While that's addressed, that's not a good situation to be in General. Saltzman, the Chief of Space Operations, says acknowledge. Yeah, it'd be helpful to have more places to launch from, but that's going to take a while. That's not something that can happen overnight. I think the first small step would be to have a national spaceport policy written down that says, yes, having spaceports is good. If we can have a network, if you will, of spaceports consisting of commercial spaceports, government spaceports, privately owned and operated launch facilities that will allow us to have assured access to space for all users while still doing a lot of other things that can be helpful. So you can do that by an executive order from the White House. You can do it with a Congressional resolution. You can do it with action by the National Space Council that turns into a space policy directive. Any of those would work. Or my favorite, let's just put it in some legislation and write it down so that people know, yes, more space ports is a good thing for the country. Spaceport infrastructure funding. The federal government has traditionally provided substantial financial funding to develop, repair or upgrade all forms of transportation infrastructure. Examples Roads, bridges, the interstate highway system, railroads, seaports, airports. Amazingly, given how important space is today, there is no comparable program to provide funding for space related infrastructure such as spaceports. Nothing. Even the $1.2 trillion infrastructure investment and Jobs act, it was recently signed. Space is not in there anywhere. What's wrong with this picture? There are lots of options for how to address this. I think the fastest, easiest, most effective way would be to take the existing space transportation infrastructure matching grants program, which Congress authorized back in the 1990s, but which hasn't been used for more than 10 years. Upgrade the words on that, put some funding on the table and let's go. I think we could prioritize the grants that it would provide based on the projected benefit to the national spaceport network on safety, capacity, efficiency and resiliency so that we have more than one place to do our launches. The Global Spaceport alliance has come up with some proposed legislation that would deal with all the things that I've been talking about. Love to hear questions, comments, feedback on any of that. But before we do that, I want to invite our panel members to come up. So, again, we've got representatives from four of our most successful spaceports to talk with us today and like to ask them to briefly go through and tell us a little bit about what's going on in their part of the world. We'll start with Bob Long, the CEO of Space Florida.
- [11:16]
Scott McLaughlin
Thanks, George. Let me start with first, orienting everybody to kind of the situation and how we see it and how we approach it in the state of Florida, obviously, with our partnerships at the KSC and the Space Force. You've got five operational vertical launch sites. There's nine in development. There's plenty of work going on. In addition to that, we also have three licensed horizontal space ports and one licensed reentry site. So you can see just along those lines. And kind of currently planned or operational infrastructure is already relatively expansive. But what I like to point out is really the state's approach holistically and across the whole state. So we have something that we have in the states called spaceport territory. And it's largely an administrative designation. But what that does is it allows us to designate areas. That then allows us, as Space Florida, to unlock our entire toolkit, financial and other programs that we have access to in order to expand our network. And it's that network approach, to George's point earlier, you know, it's not just all about the launch pads. It's about the entire system and transportation network that's required, Whether that's engine testing or manufacturing facilities or otherwise. That approach allows us to look and you can see across the whole state. Our spaceport territory is designated at Eglin, Tyndall, which is a recent one, Cecil Field up in Northwest Florida, Space Coast Regional there at Cape Canaveral, and then in Homestead as well. And so it's pretty expansive. We're looking across the entire state because we think we can actually take advantage of it. But you can imagine as you look at the infrastructure associated with that, it's pretty tough to maintain the pace, especially when you consider the multimodal aspect of it. And that's why we have all the other seaports and airports on there. Because eventually, to George's point, those are all going to be factors in a transportation network. Obviously, At Cape Canaveral having a, you know, we like to say Quinta Motel with the seaport there, plus rail, air and land as well. But all of that requires sustaining the infrastructure. And when you're looking at 66% of all the US launches, and I think it's like a third of global launches happen from Cape Canaveral, that requires a lot of investment up front. It's substantial infrastructure. It's just like any other transportation network. And you'll hear that theme come through here because that is exactly how we approach it in terms of we must find ways to address it as common use infrastructure, roads. You know, we spend as much time talking about wastewater, power and roads as we do about launch pads and seaports. I would add on that as well. So those are all important things that we must consider when we talk about what the future holds and trying to maintain that pace. Because you know, I would say we're all struggling to maintain the pace. When you start to look at launching 100 times off the Space coast, for example, and that's not us, obviously our federal partners at NASA and the Space Force are also struggling. The Space Force got some money this year, but I can tell you from experience that was a hard fought battle to try to get that. And NASA with generally seeing reduced budgets, that's impacting them as well. And that's why I think it's important when we start to look at some of these tools. And much of what George highlighted in his talk, I didn't realize until I came into this job recently the power of taking an approach where you can take advantage of the market, taking advantage of financing, taking advantage of all the things that like tax exempt bonds that every other mode of transportation can take advantage of right now, except for space. And that's why we pushed that legislation forward. And I have so far received great support for tax exempt bond legislation. But it's the approach that if you look across any municipal entity, across really, I think across the country, we can all take advantage of those. The federal government may not be able to take advantage of those. They're looking for appropriate dollars. And that's a mix that doesn't necessarily blend its very well to the pace that we're seeing out there. And as George mentioned, I'm a huge proponent of a spaceport improvement program. Like I pulled the numbers, you know, the airport improvement program for the state of Florida from the federal government was something like $200 million last year. It would be pretty impressive if every state had access to. I think it's what, two or three billion dollars of airport improvement program dollars or a similar structure to that? We definitely are large advocates of really treating space as a mode of transportation, normalizing it as such. And so you can take advantage of all the same things anywhere that there is any kind of air, rail, land, sea transportation. You should just add space. That should be blanket. It shouldn't even be a question anymore.
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General Ted Mercer
Excellent. Thank you, Rob. Okay, next we have General Ted Mercer, CEO and executive Director of the Virginia Spaceport Authority.
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Rob Long
General, thank you, Dr. Neal. It is a privilege to be here with you today. It's an exciting business, And I think Dr. Neal has laid out a very good case for you on where we sit today as a nation. Let me tell you a little bit now about who we are at the Virginia Spaceport Authority. We are a political subdivision of the Commonwealth of Virginia. What that means is we are a quasi government entity for the Commonwealth of Virginia. Our employees are not state employees. They belong to employees of the authority. I don't work directly for the Commonwealth. I work for a board of directors. So we are a quasi commercial entity that was set up by the Commonwealth years ago to do a number of things, the primary of which is to grow economic development on the Eastern Shore of the Commonwealth of Virginia. The second is to grow technology and stem for aerospace companies to come and grow on the Eastern Shore. And we are indeed doing all of those things that we were stood up to do. It also allows us being a political subdivision and authority allows us to be responsive and nimble and move very quickly because basically the buck stops with me. We are able to make a decision, acquire funding and build a launch pad. From groundbreaking to full operational status in 11 months. We have done it. So that's what the agility gives us opportunity to do. These are all of the facilities that are located at the Mid Atlantic Regional Spaceport in the Commonwealth of Virginia. We have the full value chain for launch operations, everything from receiving a payload, preparing a payload, integrating that payload to a rocket, taking that rocket to a launch pad and launching it. We have three operational launch pads. By the end of this year, we will have four. Pad zero D is under construction as we speak, and it will be pretty much completed by the end of this year. We have a payload processing facility to do the payload processing, and we can indeed hypergolic fuel. Inside our payload processing facility, we have integration facilities and we have what's called a Marscom building, which is our command building that allows us to operate all of our launch pads from inside that building. So we have the full value chain. We like to say that we are limited backup to our brethren down at the Cape. So that's the Virginia Spaceport Authority. Here's what's coming. We're modifying one of our launch pads to be able to handle the new Northrop Grumman Antares rocket, the rocket that is used to resupply our astronauts on the International Space Station. They're building a bigger, better, more efficient rocket that's coming and we're doing the modifications to the launch pad to make that happen. We're bringing liquid fuel capability to one of our launch plants to give us the capability to launch either solid or liquid fuel. That's Pad zero B right now. We use that to launch our solid fuel Minotaur class rockets made by Northrop Grumman. We're building the new launch pad that'll be complete pretty much by the end of this year. We'll then now have four operational launch pads. We're building a new Mars industrial complex. We have acquired additional property in the Commonwealth and we're building an industrial complex to handle new customers capabilities. Everything from new payload processing facilities to integration facilities to, to liquid gas producing facilities that will give us expanded capability and we have to have a place to do that. Let me also tell you that we will never be the Cape. We don't have the land mass to become the Cape, but we certainly can become a limited operational backup to the Cape. And when you talk about capability in spaceports, we have four public spaceports capable of vertical lift to orbit. Two on the west coast and two on the east coast. The two on the west coast cannot support the orbits that are supplied by the East Coast. And the two on the east coast can't supply support for orbits on the west coast. Now there is a caveat to that, which is there is a way for a launch from Vandenberg to get to equatorial orbit like we do on the east coast. There is a way to do that. It can fly south dog leg over the Panama Canal and then enter an equatorial orbit. But the performance loss of the rocket and the energy that it takes to do that is just not worth it. To do it with the payload you'd have to sacrifice. So basically you've got two on the west and two on the east for vertical lift to orbit. That's all the nation's got for vertical lift. So if we don't protect and begin to focus and pay attention to space ports, the nation is setting itself up, I think for what could be a crippling blow for our Access to space. Because none of that magic that occurs in space. None of it, whether it is your ability to geolocate a location on Earth using the GPS Constellation, or whether it's getting money out of a ATM machine, or whether it's filling up your car at a gas station and using a credit card. All of that requires a space transaction. You cannot have a space transaction without a space port to get those satellites to orbit. So thank you very much.
- [21:52]
General Ted Mercer
Thank you, General. Okay, next, let's hear from Scott McLaughlin, the executive director of the New Mexico Spaceport Authority at Spaceport America.
- [22:01]
Arturo Machuca
Thank you, George. Thanks for a chance to be here and talk to you all. So I want to talk a little bit about the Spaceport America, which is kind of the new kid on the block. And certainly we don't have any of the capacities of Florida. I kind of like the order that we're going. This kind of works out good. So. So here's some activities we do at the spaceport. So intuitive machines who actually did some testing out at the spaceport before they went to the moon. Of course, we have Virgin Galactic. And just to show you what kind of spaceport we have, we now have the Thunderbirds doing their winter training. So that's kind of a fun thing. And you'll find spaceports do lots of different things. It's not just about going to space. Even though we're the new kid on the block, we actually go back pretty far. So what made it all possible, of course, is the Federal Spaceport, Federal Commercial Space Launch Act. And in New Mexico, they had already started looking, even back in the 60s, but they got very serious about it in the 90s about whether a spaceport could be located in New Mexico. So there were studies that went all the way through the 90s. And what finally happened, of course, was the Ansari X Prize that Scale Composites and Paul Allen won, which allowed Virgin Galactic to come into being. And a deal made between our governor and Sir Richard Branson to bring Virgin Galactic to New Mexico. So we were lucky that we had kind of a horse to ride. And also they had a partner in building a spaceport. So we had to get our launch license. We had the partnership with it, and we had to fund it. And so the way New Mexico funded it is completely New Mexico money. So somewhere around $240 million, 180 million from the state and 50 million from the two local counties that voted to tax the themselves to build a spaceport. And for us, we can certainly talk about assured access to space. But for Us to get started. What it is is economic development. That's something George had talked about. So we've been slowly growing ever since. What makes our spaceport rather unique is if you look at that map on the right closely, the red outline is the White Sands Missile Range. So that's the largest testing range in the country. And from top to bottom, that's about 140 miles and about 50, 50 miles wide. And right to the left of it is Spaceport America in the red. And the blue area is the only other airspace that's controlled by DoD other than the White House, which is White Sands Missile Range airspace complex. So that airspace complex gives us some options that many other spaceports don't have and makes our flying easier. So Virgin Galactic, which has gone to space seven times in the last, I guess, 10 months now eight months, and christened a lot of new space flight participants, astronauts, private astronauts. They're able to take advantage of that airspace. And also we have other. We do lots of other things, like high altitude platform systems, again, different things in space, but allows us to do some interesting things. We did an economic impact report in 2022. We had 811 jobs and 60 million of value of new money into the state, which is a big thing for New Mexico. So it's state land that we found that we built the spaceport on. We divided in the horizontal launch area, so that's where Virgin Galactic operates. We have the vertical launch area. So although we're not doing inland orbital launch yet, I got to correct the general that, you know, that capability will exist someday, and we actually have the license to do that. What we need is technology and infrastructure to support that. And inland launch is quite possible. We also have the advanced technology area, which is where Spinlaunch is located. And they've been in the news a lot over the years trying to work on a kinetic launch system. This is not an orbital system that they have, but one that they wanted to test everything with. We have the Spaceport America cup, which we have next week. We're going to have 2,000 college aerospace students on site launching rockets they've been working on since August. Payloads that go anywhere from 10,000 to 30,000ft. This is the largest aerospace competition in the world that I know of. We have 36 states and 20 countries represented. We also have high altitude platform systems. This is kind of a pseudo space. These are UAVs that fly between 60,000 and 80,000ft, solar powered, and are designed to fly for six months at a time. And this is Kind of a new little shim in the marketplace for what can happen, what needs to happen in space, but what also can happen. Just a little bit below. We're working on a reentry license right now, an orbital reentry license. So I think of the commercial spaceports will be the only one that will actually be able to support horizontal, vertical and orbital reentry. So that's where we're looking in our future, we think is filling in the gaps in being able to go to orbit, which, I don't know, maybe in 10 or 15 years. Although at the rate that starship has been doing things, you kind of wonder if point to point and other other aspects of inland space spaceport launch are going to happen much quicker. So thank you for your time. I'm glad to be here.
- [26:59]
George Neild
We'll be right back after this quick break.
- [27:02]
General Ted Mercer
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General Ted Mercer
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- [27:31]
General Ted Mercer
Thank you, Scott. Now let's ask Arturo Machuca, the director of the Houston spaceport, for his perspective.
- [27:37]
Maria Varmazes
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Well, first of all, back in 2012, whenever the Department of Aviation for the city of Houston decided to pursue the licensing of Ellington as a commercial spaceport, people were not, I guess, clearly understanding the mission, what we wanted to do, right? And some people thought, oh, just, you know, another waste of time, another waste of resources. Well, we had a clear plan in how we were going to proceed and our expectation at the time, I have to mention we identified some resources by the federal government on the Federal Aviation Administration office commercial space, the STEM grant. And we said, well, maybe we can start a spaceport by trying to get some of that money. Well, we never got a cent right because the program has not been funded. Back in 2012, however, we kept on solid in our proposal to build a spaceport because we saw the opportunity. Back in 2012, the space economy, the global space economy was valued at $240 billion. And I remember that party line was the growth was at an 8% compounded rate, right? And I said, whoa, there's money here, Right? And today we heard the global space economy is at $550 billion and continues to grow with unlimited possibilities, Right? So we want to be part of that we as a city, we as a state, we as a country want to make sure that we are part of what's happening there. In 2015, we became the 10th commercial spaceport in the nation. Today there are 14 very excited to see the continued growth of spaceports. And as we embarked and we were a spaceport, we said, now what are we going to do? There were at the time very few operators, which remains the case. They are still working in their plans to build their the spacecraft. Well, we decided that we needed to do something a little bit different and that was to take advantage of all the great things that Houston has in terms of resources. We decided to come up with this mission and vision to build a cluster of aviation and aerospace companies that would push the transition from what used to be a federal program into, into a commercial program. It is working just like if it was well planned, Right? It is really a total success today. The Houston spaceport is home to companies like Intuitive Machines that put the US Back on the moon just last February. Right. We also have Axiom Space building the next commercial space station. Collins Aerospace, along with Axiom Space, have received three and a half billion dollars from NASA to build the next generation of spacesuits for moon and low earth orbit. Well, all this stuff sounds great, right? It's really good. But at the end, really what this means is a direct impact in the people of Houston and the people of Texas, the people of the United States. Without these developments, a lot of the things that are happening possibly would not be going on today. Right? And people, just everyday people, are getting the benefit along. The plans that we have built for the spaceport was the construction of a workforce training center. It was just something that was, I guess, almost mandatory. Without it, we couldn't do it. And I can tell you that I personally have seen stories from people working previously on Fast Food, hairdressers that have moved into the space business by getting certifications from the Edge, which is the workforce training center that we have, the spaceport. So it is very real what is happening there. So again, I hope that what is going on there gives you a clear idea of the importance of the space business. It really goes back to home and people get the benefit of all the great things that we do or we don't. The spaceport today has grown from nothing really, from a Greenfield to over 50 acres of developed area with about half a million square feet of new space. About 1800 jobs so far, projecting to end up around 2,500 for these companies that we have in the Next couple of years. And there is a significant, significant economic impact that this, this development has brought to the region. Right. Thank you, George.
- [32:23]
General Ted Mercer
Excellent. Thanks, Artur. Okay, so let me kick off some of our Q and A with a few questions and then want to invite questions from the audience as well. Rob, it seems like Florida has done so much over the years and been very strategic in his thinking in terms of his partnerships with states and federal government and financing and all the rest. Every spaceport is different. But do you think there's a role for you in space Florida to be sort of a mentor or role model for other spaceports that might not want to compete with you, but partner with you, collaborate with you, help to support what we're doing here?
- [33:06]
Scott McLaughlin
Yeah, George, I think there is something, and we've had some of those conversations recently about how do we partner, obviously. But at the same time, you know, the toolkit that we have, and I'll kind of focus it more on the financing side because I would say that's probably our secret sauce, if nothing else. Not that it's anything secret, but that's something where I think we can always. We are starting to open the aperture to understand how could we partner and take advantage almost in a franchise model, so to speak, where we would be able to say, like, hey, if there's somebody that's early in the phase, we can come in alongside, we can use our toolkit. Obviously there's a benefit to the state in terms of the financing piece of that, but then there's a partnership to be had there. Yeah, no, I think there's always room. We're so early in the process and everyone's in a different place that I think it only makes sense nationally and from an American perspective to do that.
- [33:55]
General Ted Mercer
Excellent. General Mercer, we've talked a little bit about infrastructure and infrastructure funding. With all the billionaires out there doing space stuff, why in the world should the country consider putting some taxpayer dollars into a spaceport?
- [34:13]
Rob Long
I mentioned earlier, none of all that space activity occurs without a spaceport. And right now the nation's only got four. I think that one of the things that we should be looking to do and that that I advocate for is including spaceports in one of the nation's critical infrastructure sectors. There are 16 critical infrastructure sectors that are designed to identify those areas that would directly impact the American way of life. And so those are the ones, the things that we want to be sure we as a nation protect if we believe that assured access to space is critical for the nation's security and the American public way of life and for national defense and for intelligence, then you better find a way to protect the capability to get to space, because none of that can occur without a spaceport. So I am an advocate for including spaceports in either one of the 16 critical infrastructure sectors or adding a 17. Now, I hear a lot about pushback from various sources on why we shouldn't have to do that. To me, it's a binary decision. There are administrative kinds of challenges that you'll have to overcome. There may be budgeting challenges you have to overcome. There may be regulatory challenges you'll have to overcome. But to me, it is a binary decision whether spaceports should be included in the infrastructure sectors. And I say that it is binary because you either must have them or you don't. If you must have assured access to space, then you must have spaceports. They are that critical.
- [36:21]
Maria Varmazes
George, can I add, Please. I guess I have a very practical example why we should invest in infrastructure. We at the Houston SPACeport back in 2017, we were working with one of those billionaires that you're talking about, right? And we were very, very interested in getting some of their business at the Houston spaceport. At the time, we had not built any infrastructure at the Houston spaceport other than the runways that we have as, I guess, the critical infrastructure that we need for horizontal launch. Right. So we competed against about 36 cities in the US trying to get this business. We were lucky to go all the way to the final two, but all we were showing our prospect was an empty field. It was really a green field. There was nothing but a green field there. Right. And I remember this person just asking me, arturo, this is all great, this is all great, the plans that you have, but are you really going to build it? Right. And my answer was, of course, yes, we are. Right. But he said, well, okay, we'll give you our decision. The decision did not help us. Right. They went somewhere else and we lost that great opportunity. Well, right there we decided to go ahead and move. And we invested the first $24 million to build roadways, infrastructure, utilities. That's how we built phase one of the spaceport. And really, it has been between 2020, when Covid was heavily affecting the United States and this last December that we've done all this progress is pretty, pretty incredible. And again, without infrastructure, I can tell you it is really, really hard for communities, for spaceports, for any type of infrastructure to progress.
- [38:18]
General Ted Mercer
Right, Great, thanks.
- [38:20]
Rob Long
Let me also just piggyback a final thought on that about the billionaire. I'VE heard that discussion. Those comments before too, that the government doesn't want to invest and provide money to billionaires. If you are investing money in one of your essential spaceports or your spaceports, you're not funding billionaires. What you are funding is assured access to space, the capability to get to space. That's what you're funding. So I hear that and it disturbs me because that's not what the funding goes to. It goes to the infrastructure, the space port to allow you to get to space. That's what you're funding. And there's one other point I want to make about this critical infrastructure discussion. I hear comments from others that say, well, space is included in the other critical infrastructure sectors, whether it's communications or cyber or something else. And that is a true statement. There are portions of space that are doing that. What is not included in any way, shape or form are spaceports. And spaceports are clearly severable. I think everyone at this table can divine the boundaries of their spaceport and what encompasses it. Clearly definable, that is what is not included in the critical infrastructure. So when you hear these comments about, well, space is already included. No, space ports are not. Thank you.
- [39:57]
General Ted Mercer
Great comments. Okay, so Scott, I know that New Mexico State University and Spaceport America had a very significant role in the center of Excellence for Commercial space transportation. The FAA did for 10 years. Could you talk a little bit about the potential benefits or advantages or opportunities for universities and other educational institutions to partner with spaceports, whether it's actual training and things or workforce development?
- [40:26]
Arturo Machuca
Yeah, I'll go back and say one thing about the spaceports in general though, which is. And you didn't bring it up at the National Interagency Spaceport Working Group, which is a study we're hoping to get out or see published pretty soon. And I'll let you talk more about that, George, I'm sure you'll bring about in a moment. But one of the things I wanted to point out is that each of the space ports is so unique. There's a lot of federal funding that goes into the four spaceports that the general mentions. It goes back literally decades and decades and decades. And that's what we're fighting for in terms of infrastructure is the growth that we all see will happen needs some support and guidance and strategy and dollars getting to what Dr. Neal talked to me about. Yeah, New Mexico State and New Mexico Tech even go way back in terms of partnership with NASA and looking into space. We're very focused on workforce development. We're a small state. We started actually calling the area between Los Alamos and El Paso Space Valley or even bigger. And the reason we're doing that is because we have two national laboratories and Los Alamos National Laboratory in Sandia. El Paso now is very focused on aerospace manufacturing. And of course we have a spaceport, but you got to tie all that together with workforce and stem. And so that's one of our big attributes that we do. And one way we do that is by supporting the Spaceport America cup, which is now the largest collegiate competition in aerospace. So literally next week we're going to have about 2,000 aerospace students who are going to launch rockets at the SPACeport. There's actually 6,000 that participate worldwide. They've been working on rockets since August. And we do that with Experimental Sounding Rocket association, who is our partner there, the 501C3 that actually runs the competition. But that's where the next generation is. This is where the workforce is coming from. And the people on the teams are marketing people, engineers, software people. It's actually like building a little company.
- [42:22]
Rob Long
Thank you.
- [42:23]
Scott McLaughlin
Thank you.
- [42:25]
General Ted Mercer
So, Arturo, I remember having lots of conversations with you over the years, especially when Houston was applying for its FAA spaceport license at all, and you shared some of your vision really for what Houston could become. And there was talk about an intermodal transportation hub and things like that. And looking back, we don't want to rest on our laurels from Apollo. Could you say a little bit more about that long term thinking?
- [42:56]
Maria Varmazes
So again, we are the department of Aviation for the city of Houston, George Bush Intercontinental, Hobby Airport, Ellington Airport. So we are all about transportation. And we believe that commercial space transportation will get to Houston and to the US and to the world sooner than we think. Right. We obviously want to be ready for whenever we get to that point, in which point to point becomes a reality when you will be able to jump in your spacecraft there in a Houston spaceport. Right. And arrive in Japan an hour and a half later, two hours later. While we're doing this though, I can tell you, you would think, well, none of that has happened. It has not. But the progress continues to. To move in a very, very solid pace. Venus Aerospace is a startup company that moved from California to Houston SPACeport early in 2020. This company started with nothing but a vision, a dream ride, and today they have taken their engine to a test that brought it close to Mach 1 only at 80% of the power that they needed. So pretty much this rotating detonating, it doesn't sound Good, right. But rotating detonating engine, according to the experts, is one that is very viable and that hopefully will allow us to change the way in which we travel today. We need to change the way in which we've been flying for the past 50 years. And. And the Houston spaceport wants to make sure that it's ready. That is the reason why we are embarked in building this infrastructure. We have to make sure that just like back in the age, it was important to have a port and later on, an airport. We have a spaceport. I like to throw this thought that I have always had whenever we talk about spaceports. Some people don't understand what is that a spaceport is. And I said, don't worry. Back in 1917, people didn't understand what an airport was. In fact, that's why Ellington original name is Ellington Field. There was no airport. The word airport was not there. And so that's the same thing with spaceports. Spaceports are very real and are contributing, like I said, to our people in ways that, that we should all be very proud about.
- [45:36]
General Ted Mercer
Thanks. I just have to say I think Houston has managed to embody our vision from Global Spaceport alliance of being a very successful spaceport with jobs and business and thinking and partnerships with universities and companies and the government, and yet they haven't even had a single launch.
- [46:00]
Maria Varmazes
That is correct.
- [46:01]
General Ted Mercer
But it's doing good work and that's the vision. There's no reason why we can't have lots of places around the country and around the world with that same type of activity. So let's open up to some questions from the audience, please. As local operators of spaceports, do you.
- [46:18]
Arturo Machuca
Encounter any skepticism at the state and local level? And if so, how do you counteract that?
- [46:23]
General Ted Mercer
Thank you.
- [46:24]
Rob Long
I'll be happy to jump in there. Since I'm definitely a state spaceport, I can tell you that the support from the Commonwealth legislature year over year over year has been extraordinary. Extraordinary. And it didn't matter which side of the aisle the governor or the legislature was on. They have all supported this space and our spaceport to the tune of now. They have spent almost $500 million in building infrastructure facilities, all of those facilities as capital expenditures by the Commonwealth. So I don't know about my colleagues, but I can say for the Commonwealth of Virginia, the wealth, the support is overwhelming and consistent.
- [47:14]
General Ted Mercer
Rob, if you could.
- [47:15]
Scott McLaughlin
I'll add to that. So a couple things. We benefit from a very supportive state overall. And the truth is in the numbers we have roughly over the last 10 years or so, and this, I think, helps build the case. You know, there's about about $6 billion of economic impact because of the activities that we, we interface with. So, so it's easy to argue that with our state folks. Overall, we just got another budget increase this last year as well. So, so that kind of speaks to the kind of support we get. The other things I'll add, when we go out to the financial markets, very supportive and very a lot of interest on the infrastructure side in investing and partnering, whether it's through a bond or something like that. So we see that as well. I think where the disconnect is not the disconnect, but where we would really love to see more is actually at the federal level and some of the things that we've talked about here. It's why we're I will constantly, I'll probably go to my grave with, with the view that space has to be treated just as another mode of transportation. It cannot be special when you consider policy, when you consider funding, it's the same approach. You're getting something from point A to point B. The math is a little different, maybe the physics are a little harder, all of that. But at the end of the day, you're just moving things around just like you would in sea, in air or on land. And if we approach it that way in terms of policy and how we fund, then we're ultimately going to get to the same place. And so I think that's why the state of Florida has embraced that space is an official mode of transportation. It's why I think we have been so successful in investing in the infrastructure that we have. It's over half a million dollars that we've invested, but that's leveraged up almost five times by local, by private investment. So we get a really good return on our investment when we do that. So that's why I say if you keep the first principles, you don't overcomplicate it. And then at the federal level we can do that, then it benefits everybody here at this table and really the nation overall.
- [49:07]
General Ted Mercer
Scott, I know you already mentioned that small spaceport America was built with mostly state money, but any additional comments you had on state support or frustration or.
- [49:18]
Arturo Machuca
Opportunities, I think to answer the question, we have much more of a mixed bag. The state and the two counties built the spaceport, but we don't have the longevity of federal missions that go literally back the decades. So there are plenty of skeptical people in the state of New Mexico and state, even local, even though we're starting to see pretty big success. And that's one of the reasons I really want there to be more of a national strategy. Starship has moved so fast and SpaceX has moved so fast that it's actually kind of hard to predict what's going to happen. But inland spaceports are going to become important at some point. And really the nation's not doing anything to teach us, to partner with us, to pay for it. We're really not seeing much. We're kind of doing it on our own until something bigger happens, until we get a customer. And I think we will eventually. I would love to see a national program of learning how to launch from an inland spaceport. What has to happen to a horizontal or vertical rocket to make it safe to have abort modes so it could launch inland. But there's, I don't know anywhere in the federal government where there's any conversation of that kind right now.
- [50:24]
General Ted Mercer
Good points. One more question.
- [50:27]
Maria Varmazes
Thank you, panel.
- [50:28]
General Ted Mercer
Mike Kushler from Deloitte. So one of the things that you spoke about really resonated with me, which.
- [50:34]
Scott McLaughlin
Is the sort of the competitive investment.
- [50:36]
General Ted Mercer
Attraction process that you went through with.
- [50:38]
Scott McLaughlin
One billionaire in particular, but wanted to broaden that question to say one of.
- [50:42]
General Ted Mercer
The businesses that you're in is exactly that investment attraction. So when you have investors that are.
- [50:47]
Scott McLaughlin
Coming to your spaceports, they have other options.
- [50:50]
General Ted Mercer
What are the kinds of things that.
- [50:51]
Scott McLaughlin
They'Re looking for when it comes to.
- [50:53]
General Ted Mercer
Infrastructure, ease of doing business, which is.
- [50:56]
Scott McLaughlin
A lot of things built into there.
- [50:58]
General Ted Mercer
Geographical location, launch trajectories?
- [51:01]
Scott McLaughlin
Probably all of the above.
- [51:03]
General Ted Mercer
But what as US organizations, how are you prioritizing the way that you can.
- [51:07]
Maria Varmazes
Be as attractive as possible to industry? For us, without a question, workforce has been one that resonates every time that we sit at the table to talk about a business. Having the workforce ready is so important. That's why since 2014, actually before we got the license, we embarked in forming a number of relationships with local colleges and universities to make sure that we had that talent pool. Right. And then of course, you know, there's always that, that fact that, that when companies come and, and, and I guess some are looking for the best place to establish, they're looking for incentives, some sort of support. Right. And obviously we have to be very mindful in how we utilize the resources that we have. We saw the need to have that infrastructure that will allow them to save money where they need to save it. Right. And yet attract them. And I would be remiss if I don't mention, as we were Talking about the state of Texas, just last September announced the formation of the Texas Space Commission, which was funded with $350 million precisely for this type of activities. $200 million are going to Texas A and M for the opening of a campus, rather just adjacent to Johnson space Center. And 150 million are yet to be, I guess, allocated. But the expectation that we have is that we will be able to use some of those resources to try to support the business cases that we're pursuing.
- [52:55]
Rob Long
I might also add from the Virginia space force perspective, there are what I call the big four five things that they're interested in, whether it's an investor or whether it's a new company that wants to come to the spaceport. The first is, as my colleague mentioned, is there the stem pool that I can hire from? I'm not going to import people. So is that there? Next, is housing, is there adequate housing there for employees or the folks that will migrate to the area? Is there adequate medical care for the folks that are coming up there? Are they going to be able to get semen by doctors or hospitals if they need to? Are there adequate schools when their children come up? Are they going to be able to go to good schools to get educated up there? And then the final one, or there's another one about childcare. Is childcare available? And then the fifth one that's kind of on the periphery is spousal employment. Those are the big five that they want to know when they're looking to come to that area, whether it's an investor or others. And then one other thing I might piggyback on also one of the comments my colleagues made about inland spaceports and being able to launch from inland. We're going to have to get there at some point in time. The writing is on the wall. It's just a matter of acknowledging it. I think the long pole in the tent for that is working with the established safety community and determining when a rocket is considered routine. How many consecutive successful launches does it have to have before you classify it as routine, as you do an airplane? Airplanes fly over populated areas all the time. There are incidences where they will come down and crash. Sometimes there is no such thing as zero risk. But if a rocket Design has launched 100 times consecutively successfully, 200 times consecutively successfully, how much risk are you really taking? Right. And the safety community is really, really pushes back on that. Right. But you're going to have to come to some decision. And I personally don't care what that number is, but pick that number that is at acceptable risk and not zero risk. You'll never get to zero risk, but is it acceptable risk? And with what we see is coming, what we know is coming, we're going to have to figure out how you can go from inland at some point. Thank you.
- [55:33]
General Ted Mercer
Okay, well, come to the end of our time. I want to thank all of you for being here. If you have additional questions or want to know more about the Global Spaceport alliance, check out our website, global space spaceportalliance.com thanks a lot for being here today.
- [56:02]
George Neild
That's it for T Minus Deep Space, brought to you by N2K CyberWire. We'd love to know what you think of this podcast. You can email us@snap space2k.com or submit the survey in the show notes. Your feedback ensures we deliver the information that keeps you a step ahead in the rapidly changing space industry. T Minus Deep Space is produced by Alice Carruth. Our associate producer is Liz Stokes. We are mixed by Elliot Peltzman and Trey Hester with original music by Elliot Peltzman. Our executive producer is Jennifer Ibin. Our executive editor is Brandon Karp. Simone Bachelor Trella is our president. Peter Kilby is our publisher. And I'm your host, Maria Varmazes. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next.