President Donald Trump signed an executive order in August to “strengthen the nation’s space workforce” and “develop the next generation of space leaders” with the creation of a U.S. Space Academy.
NASA is looking for input from governors on whether their state is interested in hosting and sponsoring the new academy. A Request for Information, with specific guidelines, encourages each state to turn in a submission with applications due by October 26.
Last Friday, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-Louisiana) led a Louisiana delegation in writing a joint letter of support for the Space Academy to be built in Southwest Louisiana.
“Michoud has been in the New Orleans metropolitan area for quite some time doing rocket propulsion. So, NASA has had a footprint there,” Gov. Jeff Landry (R-Louisiana) says, speaking on Louisiana’s long history with the space program.
Michoud is a huge NASA-owned, contractor-operated manufacturing complex that NASA has used for rocket and spacecraft construction since 1961. NASA calls it “America’s Rocket Factory.”
Landry told “Washington Watch” he thinks about 30-40% of the people that work at Stennis Space Center, across the border in Mississippi, actually live in Louisiana.
“A couple of weeks ago, about a month ago, we announced that Elon Musk is going to build the largest space launching facility in the world right on the coast in Louisiana,” Landry states. “Louisiana is absolutely positioned for the Space Academy.”
Elon Musk’s SpaceX announced in August that it will build a massive new rocket-launching complex called “Starbase Louisiana” in Vermilion Parish, near Pecan Island on Louisiana’s coast. The project is being described by Louisiana officials as the largest capital investment in state history.
The aeronautical industry, Landry notes, is being built quickly in the New Orleans metropolitan area and across the coast of the Bayou State.
Competitor states for the Space Academy, says Fox 54, are Texas, Florida, Alabama and Colorado. According to KBTX News 3, John Boyd, a cooperate site selection consultant, named Texas and Florida as the frontrunners.
As NASA considers the applications, Landry hopes that they view Louisiana as a corridor for the space industry with so much growth possibility.
“We've been landing a lot of great projects here in Louisiana. We've really improved our business climate. When you look at the New Orleans area where Steve is focused on trying to get the Space Academy, we've got some great institutions of higher learning. We've got a great workforce,” Landry says.
Massive Starbase facility
He believes Musk’s new Starbase project can be five to eight times bigger than anything seen in the U.S.
“It could be five times bigger than in Cape Canaveral and maybe 10 times bigger than what he's got down in Boca Chica, (Dominican Republic),” Landry says. “You think about what that is going to bring to Louisiana, not only the launches, but the expertise, the ingenuity and the engineering of SpaceX and its relationship with NASA.”
He doubts people realize how important this second space race is, as compared to the one in the 1960s.
“We don't want China to beat us out on technology and to be out in space and to be able to do things that the United States can't do. This is extremely important from a national security standpoint and for keeping American dominance around the globe.”
Louisiana is ready to do its part, Landry says.
