Part 450Rulemaking Committee, SpaceX Environmental Review, FAA 2025 Commercial Space Conference

As commercial space operations continue to grow and expand capabilities, the FAA is very interested in playing nice with all the new operators coming online and to do so it has established an Aerospace Rulemaking Committee known as a SpARC.

The SpARC will gather members of academia and commercial space businesses to come up with ideas how to instill more clarity, efficiency, flexibility, and innovation into the Part 450 launch and reentry licensing rule.

The committee will focus on nine topics including flight safety analysis, system safety, and means of compliance. By late summer 2025 the committee is expected to submit a report with recommended changes to Part 450 which FAA would use to plan future rulemaking revisions.

The FAA is hosting five public meetings and seeking public comment on a revised draft environmental assessment to analyze SpaceX’s proposal to increase the number of annual orbital launches and landings of Starship/Super Heavy in Boca Chica, Texas.

The public comment period began November 20 and closes on January 17, 2025.

The FAA will hold the 2025 Commercial Space Conference co-hosted by the Commercial Space Federation on February 12, 2025, at the Conrad Hotel in Washington, D.C. There will be discussion panels, speakers, and networking opportunities related to commercial space policy issues.

FAA reported that the number of FAA-licensed commercial space operations (launches + reentries) grew by 900 percent in the past 10 years to a new record total of 148 in FY 2024. The agency issued two new licenses, 10 renewals, and 37 license modifications. It conducted 23 environmental reviews and performed 810 inspections.

The FAA has issued 7 licenses under the new Part 450 regulations. Those holding licenses are Astra Space, ABL Space, Inversion Space, Relativity Space, SpaceX, Stratolaunch, and Varda Space.

FMI:  www.faa.gov/