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#1 2026-08-26 07:07:27
- tahanson43206
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Starbase Louisiana
The article in Post #3 is about a large space port that might be built in Louisiana.
If built, this would be the largest spaceport in the world, with flight tempo approaching 30 launches per day.
The site is reported to be attractive for sun synchronous launches.
This topic was chosen because the entire concept is a business proposal by the SpaceX corporation.
The site is a wetlands that is full of wildlife, and there are some folks in Louisiana who will be interested in protecting that wildlife from this advanced industrial operation. The permitting process is expected to take years.
SpaceX has (apparently) committed itself to being good stewards of the environment, but how well they perform remains to be seen.
The State of Louisiana leadership appears to be in favor of this project, because it would definitely bring a flow of business to the state.
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#2 2026-08-26 07:08:16
- tahanson43206
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
This post is reserved for an index to posts that may be contributed by NewMars members.
Index:
Post #3: Opening report from CNN about the proposed space port
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#3 2026-08-26 07:10:19
- tahanson43206
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
This post contains a report from CNN about a proposed space port in Louisiana.
SpaceX plans to build the ‘biggest launch site on Earth’ for $100 billion in Louisiana
By
Jackie Wattles
Updated 14 hr ago << 2026/08/26SpaceX's Starship rocket lifts off for a test flight from Starbase, Texas, on July 24. Eric Gay/AP/File
SpaceX on Tuesday unveiled plans to construct a massive, $100 billion spaceport in Louisiana, where the company plans to launch its gargantuan Starship rocket thousands of times per year.
Construction of the spaceport is expected to begin by the end of next year near the southern coast of Louisiana’s Vermilion Parish, with the first launch targeted as soon as 2029, according to an economic development website.
Such a development would mark a dramatic shift for SpaceX and the US rocket industry — making Louisiana, which has never before hosted an orbital launch, perhaps the busiest launch hub on the planet.
The new SpaceX campus will be dubbed “Starbase, Louisiana” — borrowing the name of SpaceX’s recently incorporated company town in South Texas. Starbase, Texas, is the current home to Starship’s testing and development facilities and the spot from which 13 test flights have launched to varying degrees of success.
The Louisiana location, however, would host flights of the Starship rocket once its operational, having proven it can safely haul cargo to orbit. SpaceX also plans to land and recover every piece of its Starship rockets — including the upper spacecraft, which has never been done before — in order to allow the rockets to be rapidly reused and drive down the cost of each launch.
That means Louisiana would not only become a hub for launches, but it would become home to numerous towers — standing hundreds of feet tall — that would be used to recapture rockets and spacecraft as they return from space.
“Starbase Louisiana will ultimately have over a dozen launch towers, enabling more than 30 Starship flights per day and making it the biggest launch site on Earth!” SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said on his social media platform, X, on Tuesday.
During an announcement event in Louisiana Tuesday, SpaceX’s chief operating officer, Gwynne Shotwell, also described the project as “a self-sustaining spaceport with its own propellant production, power generation, deep water shipping capabilities, vehicle processing facilities, and probably an airport.”
Louisiana’s ‘worst kept secret’
SpaceX had been quietly working on its spaceport plans alongside Louisiana elected officials for months. Company leaders have traveled to the state to scope out potential locations, prompting one local news outlet to refer to the project as the state’s “worst kept secret.”
State governor Jeff Landry, a Republican, billed the project as an offer of “a permanent future and lasting prosperity.”
“For generations, industries came to Louisiana not to build lasting prosperity, but to extract wealth,” Landry said. “Too often, Louisiana was left with the scars, while others enjoyed the profit. Today, what Elon Musk and his team is offering Louisiana is different.”
Much about the plans remain to be seen. Starship is not yet operational. The company is expected to launch its most important test flight to date as soon as September — a mission that could send the rocket to orbit for the first time. Additional testing will be necessary to sort out how the rocket’s upper stage can be landed and flown again.
A spaceport of such size and scale as the Louisiana project will also likely face extensive regulatory reviews: “The project will go through all applicable environmental, wetlands, natural resource and launch-related reviews,” a project website confirms.
Such reviews related to SpaceX’s facilities in Texas — a far smaller complex than the planned Louisiana site — took nearly a decade to complete. And some local environmental advocacy groups continue to battle the company in Texas courts over the impacts of rocket testing on the community.
Shotwell said Tuesday that SpaceX plans to keep “very large portions” of Starbase Louisiana’s 125,000 acres of land “untouched, so that high-value wetlands stay habitat and don’t become infrastructure.”
“We will help fund protection, restoration, and stewardship while we build,” Shotwell said.
The announcement is the latest in a long list of displays of confidence that Starship will transform SpaceX as a company. Already, SpaceX has said it’s begun to phase out use of its workhorse Falcon 9 rockets, which are currently the most prolific launch vehicles in the world, in favor of using Starship for most missions once it becomes operational.
Earlier on Tuesday, SpaceX’s vice president of launch, Kiko Dontchev, said a Falcon 9 rocket that took flight the same morning would be the last ever to carry SpaceX Starlink satellites from Florida — an area due East of Orlando that is currently home to the world’s busiest spaceport across Kennedy Space Center and the Cape Canaveral Space Force Center.
“From here on, Starlink missions out of Florida will fly on Starship,” Dontchev said. “The West Coast team will continue regularly launching Starlink from Vandenberg. Super proud of this incredible team. You’ve made Falcon 9 the most reliable launch vehicle in history. You also helped build the largest low-Earth orbit satellite constellation providing connectivity to millions around the world, and you’ve set the foundation for what’s next.”
SpaceX’s plans include continuing to fly Starship out of Texas, and it may begin flights from Florida as soon as this year. But the envisioned plans for Louisiana would make it by far the largest base of operations for the rocket.
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#4 2026-08-26 11:30:16
- Void
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
I think that wildlife refuges are likely to be very compatible, as they help to keep people from living near the launch facilities.
As far as toxic effects to, marshes produce Methane as a natural thing, and Oxygen is of course natural.
I expect that there will be a push to make it grow fast as it has national security implications.
The left of course being sympathetic sometimes to un-American things, will try to be a catspaw for unfriendly powers in the world.
I think that public is starting to get wise to the games of the left though.
Ending Pending 
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#5 2026-08-26 17:31:00
- SpaceNut
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
if I recall the oil rigs were to be converted for methane processing and possible launch platforms.
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#6 2026-08-27 09:15:53
- Void
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
Eventually with that many launch towers, they could launch 6-7 Starships almost all at the same time.
Potentially then to transfer propellants to the one that is a Lunar Starship.
For this to work then 5-6 of the Starships have to be Expendable. I believe that they would be Version 4, and might lift at least 200-250 tons of propellants.
The question then is what do you do with the 5-6 "Expendable" Starships?
I am looking at them being scrapped, and converted into propellants for Neumann Drive and Magdrive propulsion systems.
That would then be 500-700 tons of metals, and these Metal>Plasma drives may be 10 times or more efficient with propellant than is Metha-Lox. So, the equivalent of perhaps 5000 to 7000 tons or better, of propulsion mass, presuming these ships can be scrapped to produce such propellants.
This might allow slow acceleration sending of Cargos to Lunar Orbit.
Ending Pending
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#7 2026-08-27 11:25:53
- Void
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
Per a request by (th):
Query: "SpaceX may use expendable tankers to fill Lunar Starship?"
Quote:
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SpaceX’s Expendable Tanker Starships for Lunar Starship Refueling
SpaceX is exploring the use of expendable Starship tanker variants to help fuel its lunar Human Landing System (HLS) more quickly and simply, potentially reducing the need for full reusability in the early Artemis missions.Current Lunar Mission Architecture
NASA’s Artemis III and later missions plan to:Launch a Starship depot into low Earth orbit (LEO) carrying propellant for the HLS.
Use Starship tanker spacecraft to refuel the depot multiple times before the HLS departs for the Moon
Wikipedia
Wikipedia
.The HLS then rendezvouses with Orion in a near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO) and lands astronauts on the lunar surface
Wikipedia
Wikipedia
.This approach requires multiple tanker flights to top up the depot, which can be time-consuming and complex if the tankers are fully reusable.
Why Expendable Tankers?
A recent SpaceX update suggested that “expendable Starships” could accelerate lunar missions
Ars Technica
Ars Technica
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. Key reasons include:Reduced complexity: Expendable tankers don’t need the full reusability systems (heat shields, landing flaps, advanced plumbing, and recovery hardware), lowering cost and development risk
elonbuzz.com
elonbuzz.com
.Faster turnaround: Without the need for refurbishment, tankers can be used for multiple missions in a row, speeding up propellant delivery to the depot.
Simplified mission profile: NASA is pushing for “nimble” plans, and expendable tankers fit that by avoiding major hardware changes to the existing Starship design
Ars Technica
Ars Technica
.How It Would Work
Tanker variant: A Starship upper stage configured to carry propellant to LEO, rendezvous with the depot, transfer fuel, and then be discarded.Depot variant: A Starship without crew systems, optimized for storing methane and oxygen for the HLS.
HLS variant: The crewed lander, stripped of Earth-return systems, optimized for lunar operations
Wikipedia
Wikipedia
+1
.
Implications
If adopted, expendable tankers could:Shorten the Artemis III timeline by reducing depot refueling delays.
Lower mission costs by avoiding reusability investments in early flights.
Allow NASA and SpaceX to test lunar operations with a simpler, faster-to-deploy system before committing to full reusability.
In short, SpaceX is considering using expendable Starship tankers to refuel the lunar depot, which could make the HLS mission faster, cheaper, and less complex in the near term
There are some interesting wrinkles in this sort of plan.
At first to do this, SpaceX would have to crank out several brand-new minimal Starships. This would be to get the ball rolling as per the Moon.
But later it might be that they could convert used and outdated hardware to the purpose.
They have done this with "Falcon Heavy-Center Core". They use it as a Falcon 9 a number of times before they put it into a Falcon Heavy stack. Then they use the center core as expendable to increase the Falcon Heavy lift capabilities.
So, later on as Full-Fledged Starships might become outdated in model, and have been used a number of times they could strip the heat shield off of them and the flaps and motors and then use one expendable one time.
As they would build up a history of the number of repeats a ship can do, they might retire them to orbit this way. Similar thing for the engines.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Perhaps at first they will crash these into the Pacific when done with them, but I feel it would only make sense to scrap them in orbit to make metal propellants or to make parts for Satellites. Possibly they could make parts for Starlink or Starmind Satellites.
If they are converted to propellants, then they might be used in either Neumann Drives or Magdrives.
Ending Pending
Last edited by Void (2026-08-27 11:34:49)
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#8 2026-08-27 15:15:37
- Void
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
(th) has another question: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 10#p241210
Quote:
tahanson43206
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For Void re follow up post about reusable vs expendable Starships ... thank you for the explanation.It appears that NASA is willing to pay more for the hardware to gain speed for the mission tempo.
One detail caught my eye.... CoPilot appears to have become slightly confused ...
Faster turnaround: Without the need for refurbishment, tankers can be used for multiple missions in a row, speeding up propellant delivery to the depot.
I would imagine this is a magical tanker?
It can be expended and then magically reappear at the launch site?
(th)
Yes, you have a point. You cannot bring a naked Starship back to Earth without burning it up.
Quote:
I would imagine this is a magical tanker?
And so, yes a bit of magic is needed to do anything more with them.
1) I have already suggested that they can be converted to metal propellants for Neumann Drive and Magdrive propulsion systems.
2) They might be converted to Space Stations, but they are "Naked" and have no radiation protection or life support.
3) You might convert them to parts for Starlink and Starmind, as eventually it is expected to do that from Moon materials.
4) The problem of #2 can be addressed by flying one to the Moon and landing it. Moon materials can provide life suppor/protection.
*But for #4, now how do you fly it to the Moon? You would have to lift propellants to LEO it seems. If you had the process #1 that could move such a "Naked Starship" to low Lunar orbit. If you had Metha-Lox at Low Lunar Orbit from a Depot then you could fill the ship with a small amount and then land the ship. LOX could come from the Moon and Methane would have been transported to the Depot using propulsion method #1.
You could put a Perovskite Solar Panel on the skin of the "Naked Starship" (Maybe). That could help power the process of moving the not quite "Naked" Starship to Low Lunar Orbit.
In any case a "Naked" or almost "Naked" Starship could be used for some purpose on the surface of the Moon. In some cases it might be buried to provide radiation protection. 3D printers and other method might make it possible to provide some parts for life support, and furnishings.
Alternately if you do not like Metal>Plasma propulsion, then a Full Starship could put 150 tons on one of these, 150 tons of Argon with a pinch of Xenon. Performance being at least 10 times as good as Metha-Lox, then that is the equivalent of 1500 tons of Metha-Lox propellant. But then you also have to have an electric drive system that can move the device somewhere.
I imagine that the "Magical Arts" will expand over time, but yes there are limits to subsequent utility of a "Naked" Starship after you launch it to LEO. And you can't just leave it in orbit without tending to it or moving it to another location.
Ending Pending
Last edited by Void (2026-08-27 15:40:11)
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#9 Yesterday 08:18:17
- Void
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
Not much activity here and I have coffee to drink.
In light of the idea of Reusable Starships vs. Repurpose Starships, I can offer the "False Nose" Starship which would be a compromise.
I have suggested a "False Nose Starship" elsewhere previously: 
This would actually be presentable as a modification of a "Alligator or Hungry Hippo", cargo compartment.
https://cropman.ru/ll/
Image Quote: 
Just get rid of the "Frunk Lid". Frunk = "Forward Trunk".
In my drawing I also snubbed the nose, but you do not have to.
Put a giant Capsule into the lidless Frunk, and leave it in orbit.
So, then you separate the "Locomotive" and "Cargo" functions of the ship.
Get rid of the lid and the mechanisms to open and close it.
The giant capsule might be modified to be a method of "Starfall". Or more likely it can be left in orbit and be repurposed or recycled for a new function or as materials.
Doing that then the reentry heat will be slightly less, and the mass to land will be a bit lighter, requiring less propellants.
You might also turn the giant capsule into a Moon lander as well.
But then in the end, after a certain number of flights it might become standard practice to retire the "Locomotive" to orbit for repurpose and recycling.
Ending Pending
Last edited by Void (Yesterday 08:32:51)
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#10 Today 09:04:49
- Void
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Re: Starbase Louisiana
The logic of reusability has a value, but also the logic of mass production has a value. Blending the two, could be done while mostly excluding the one-time use of a product, using reusability, and repurposing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Starfall
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SpaceX successfully launched its first Starfall reentry capsule on June 23, 2026, demonstrating a new system for returning cargo from orbit.
Mission Overview
The Starfall Demo mission lifted off aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida, at 6:53 a.m. EDT on June 23, 2026, with favorable weather conditions reported at 95% go for launch
nasaspaceflight.com
nasaspaceflight.com
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. The mission tested the Starfall capsule, a disk-shaped, uncrewed spacecraft designed to return payloads from low-Earth orbit (LEO) and support in-space manufacturing
Yahoo
Yahoo
+2
.Design and Specifications
Starfall is a cylindrical, hockey puck-shaped capsule measuring 3.1 meters (10.2 feet) in diameter and 0.75 meters (2.5 feet) in height, with an empty mass of 2,100 kg (4,600 lb) and a total mass of approximately 3,100 kg (6,800 lb) when fully loaded
Wikipedia
Wikipedia
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. It can carry up to 1,000 kg (2,200 lb) of payload in a volume of 2.5 × 1.5 × 0.5 meters. The capsule consists of two main sections: a top plate for payload storage and attitude control, and a carbon-fiber heat shield that jettisons before a parachute-assisted splashdown in the Pacific Ocean, roughly 1,300 km off the U.S. west coast
Wikipedia
Wikipedia
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.Operational Features
Starfall lacks a main propulsion system and cannot deorbit itself; it relies on the launch vehicle to guide it back into the atmosphere. Compressed nitrogen gas is used for attitude control during reentry, and a sequence of drogue, pilot, and main parachutes ensures a safe splashdown
nasaspaceflight.com
nasaspaceflight.com
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. Recovery teams retrieve the capsule, heat shield, and parachutes for reuse.Applications
Starfall is designed for point-to-point cargo delivery and in-orbit manufacturing, particularly for pharmaceuticals, advanced materials, and potentially bio-printed organs that benefit from microgravity
Gizmodo
Gizmodo
+2
. The capsule could also serve military logistics, enabling rapid global resupply without the need for terrestrial infrastructure
Ars Technica
Ars Technica
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. Starfall complements SpaceX’s Starship, which handles heavy-lift cargo, by providing precise return capabilities for smaller payloads.Significance
The successful Starfall launch demonstrates SpaceX’s ability to provide affordable, routine access to microgravity environments and rapid cargo return from orbit. It represents a step toward a self-sustaining commercial in-space manufacturing ecosystem and could eventually allow daily returns of critical cargo from space
nextbigfuture.com
nextbigfuture.com
+1
. The mission also highlights SpaceX’s growing role in point-to-point orbital logistics, potentially giving the company an early advantage in global space cargo delivery
Ars Technica
Ars Technica
+1
.Read less
Starfall makes a lot of sense. This disengages Starship from the responsibility of DownMass from Orbit.
Downmass inside of a Starship will stress the Starship heat shield, which is needed to protect the "Locomotive" of the Starship.
If the partial Frunk Starship could work, then you could stack many slices of Starfall into it and also include a Capsule.
So, if this could work to reenter the "Locomotive" on it's own, there are also left behind in orbit 3 Starfall devices, #3 is a capsuel.
So, you could have 3 main types (And probably other types as well):
1) Upmass Starships such as are under development.
2) Downmass Starships perhaps like what I showed in the diagram.
3) Naked Starships.
3) Naked Starships would be "Expendable to Orbit".
* But if you have a Metal>Plasma propulsion system you could bring them to low Lunar orbit and give them enough Methalox to land.
2) Downmass Starships could bring things down, such as microgravity products, and Starship Raptor engines, and other parts.
Even though they are Downmass Starships the Starfall "Shipping Containers", could bring up mass like propellant metals and other propellants.
3) The Upmass Starships would do just that bring mass up, including propellants of many kinds.
Where I have mentioned Neumann Drive and Magdrive as methods to move "Naked Starships" to Low Lunar Orbit, NASA seems to be developing a device that is Lithium>Plasma.
While it may be hard to obtain Lithium on the Moon the Earth can provide a lot of it.
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasa-fire … s-to-mars/
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NASA’s Lithium-Fed Propulsion Device
NASA has recently tested a lithium-fed magnetoplasmadynamic (MPD) thruster at its Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) that could significantly advance deep-space and Mars missions
NASA
NASA
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.What it is
The device is an electromagnetic thruster that uses lithium metal vapor as its propellant. It works by ionizing the lithium vapor with intense magnetic fields, accelerating the resulting plasma to produce thrust. This is a type of electric propulsion, which is far more fuel-efficient than traditional chemical rockets — using up to 90% less propellant
NASA
NASA
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.Key test results
Date & location: February 24, 2026, at JPL’s Electric Propulsion Lab in Southern California.Power level: Reached 120 kilowatts, the highest ever achieved in the U.S. for an electric propulsion system
NASA
NASA
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.Thrust characteristics: Low, continuous thrust over long durations, ideal for gradual acceleration to high speeds.
Temperature: The central tungsten electrode glowed bright white, exceeding 5,000°F (2,800°C) during five ignitions
ScienceDaily
ScienceDaily
+1
.Facility: Tested in JPL’s Condensable Metal Propellant (CoMeT) vacuum facility, designed to safely handle metal-vapor propellants at megawatt-class power levels
tech.yahoo.com
tech.yahoo.com
.Potential applications
Crewed Mars missions: Could be part of a nuclear electric propulsion system, enabling faster transit times and reduced fuel needs
NASA
NASA
+1
.Robotic deep-space missions: Suitable for robotic spacecraft traveling throughout the solar system.
Efficiency gains: Electric propulsion allows spacecraft to reach higher speeds over time, making long-duration missions more feasible.
Why it matters
This is the first time in the U.S. an electric propulsion system has operated at such high power, marking a major step toward human missions to Mars and advanced robotic exploration
NASA
NASA
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. The data from this test will guide further development, including scaling up for flight systems.In short, NASA’s lithium-fed MPD thruster is a high-power, efficient propulsion concept that could revolutionize how we send spacecraft — and astronauts — to distant destinations.
So, if we suppose that we can efficiently send "Naked Starships" to land on the Moon with just a little bit of provided Methalox,
And if there is very cheap robotic labor, to build "Naked Starships",
Then Mass Production of "Naked Starships" starts to make sense. They can rise up to LEO, with heavy cargos, and then slowly moved to a Low Lunar Orbit.
The same slow process could move quantities of Carbon and water to a Lunar proximate orbit where a station could manufacture the small amount of Methalox needed.
When a "Naked Starship" then lands on the Moon, its value may rise quite a bit because Lunar resources manufactured from Lunar Raw Materials, can greatly add life support to them, including radiation protection.
So, perhaps imagine landing 500 "Naked Starships a year on the Moon and building a very large city with them.
Ending Pending
I suppose I could suggest a method to land the "Naked Starships" sideways on the Moon. You would have a dedicated sort of a "Skycrane", that would be sort of a skeletal device and would take a Starship in orbit and position it to land it sideways to the Lunar Surface.
This would allow the removal of Raptor engines and associated steering hardware, and avionics from the "Naked Starship", in LEO, and those could be loaded into a Capsule type Starfall, and returned to Earth.
After that the "Naked Starship" would not need engines as it would be moved to Low Lunar Orbit by Metal>Plasma propulsion, and would be landed using a "SkyCrane" frame.
Ending Pending
Last edited by Void (Today 09:46:18)
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