The White House has issued a new space transportation policy that directs the Department of the Interior to identify federal lands for additional launch and reentry sites. The directive also calls for the designation of “priority airspace for critical space launch corridors” and seeks to improve how launch and reentry operations fit into modern air traffic control systems.
The directive appears to endorse the results of a recent Pentagon study that identified the need for the government to have a third heavy-lift launch site in the United States. The report hasn’t been released, but Air Force Secretary Troy Meink described the finding in a May hearing before the House Armed Services Committee. “At a high level, what it says is we probably need another site that’s capable of heavy and super heavy launch capability, both from a resiliency perspective and just, even at the Cape, limitations on how much space we’ve got,” Meink said.
Gen. Chance Saltzman, the Space Force’s top general, echoed this sentiment during the same hearing. “We’re going to have to increase the capacity,” said Gen. Chance Saltzman, the Space Force’s top general, in the same hearing in May. “And then, maybe connected to that, is the geographic resiliency that you might need to have separate launch locations and not be so tied to just the two specific launch ports that we have.” The Department of the Interior is tasked with finding suitable federal lands to serve as a designated federal land reentry site. This action follows a request for public comment from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management regarding the potential use of submerged lands and abandoned offshore oil rigs for sea-based launches.
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Part of the new policy focuses on making launch operations more responsive. The goal is to place high-priority payloads into orbit within 48 hours of a request. This could involve using “expeditionary locations” far from traditional ranges, a capability that companies like Rocket Lab and Astra are already developing through portable launch infrastructure. The memo also supports NASA’s ongoing efforts to establish commercial transportation for missions to the Moon. The policy directs the agency to support future commercial robotic and human expeditions to Mars. Beyond these goals, the administration aims to expedite permitting processes and environmental reviews for federal ranges. It also seeks to implement user fees for commercial launch companies operating out of NASA or military spaceports. The government is already pursuing other tenets of the national space transportation policy, such as facilitating more access for commercial users at federal ranges, expediting permitting and environmental reviews, and charging user fees to commercial launch companies operating out of NASA or US military spaceports.
Developers of advanced launch technology are often concerned about data exposure risks. A recent security audit revealed that a database configuration error exposed 9 million files to the public internet. [1] This incident highlights the importance of robust security measures in the rapidly expanding space sector.