About the PEIS
The intent of this PEIS is to facilitate the development of a permit application package and the subsequent environmental review by the FAA, and to ensure that the issuance of an experimental permit is consistent with the FAA's mission of protecting public health and safety, safety of property, and the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States.
Issuing an experimental permit is a Federal action, and is therefore subject to NEPA review. The FAA is preparing this PEIS to examine the environmental impacts of reusable suborbital rockets operating under an experimental permit. This PEIS will provide information and analysis common to all reusable suborbital rockets, will facilitate tiering of subsequent Environmental Assessments and Environmental Impact Statements, and will allow the environmental analysis of an individual permit applicant to focus on the environmental effects specific to their permit application. The FAA's intent is to focus the scope of future environmental analyses and improve the efficiency of acting on individual permit applications.
The proposed action for this PEIS is to issue experimental permits for the launch and reentry of reusable suborbital rockets, develop, the environmental criteria for issuing those permits, and prepare documentation that can be referenced or tied from in future applications. Suborbital rocket means a vehicle, rocket-propelled in whole or in part, intended for flight on a suborbital trajectory, the thrust of which is greater than its lift for the majority of the rocket-powered portion of its ascent. Suborbital trajectory means the intentional flight path of a launch vehicle, reentry vehicle, or any portion thereof, whose vacuum instantaneous impact point does not leave the surface of the Earth. The proposed action included four concept reusable suborbital vehicles based on the type of take-off and includes:
- A vertical take-off suborbital rocket,
- A combination jet and rocket powered horizontal take-off suborbital rocket,
- A horizontal take-off suborbital rocket, and
- A suborbital rocket that requires a support aircraft or balloon to transport the rocket to altitude
For each type of suborbital rocket, a range of propellants will be analyzed including those used in liquid and hybrid rocket engines. In addition, the type of landing, vertical or horizontal, will be analyzed in the PEIS. Under the proposed action, the launch and reentry would occur from an FAA-licenced launch site. The FAA will evaluate the impact associated with each concept vehicle from the following locations: Mojave Airport, Mojave, California; California Spaceport, Vandenberg Air Force Base, California; Spaceport Florida, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida; Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport, Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia; the proposed Oklahoma Spaceport, Burns Flat, Oklahoma; and the proposed Southwest Regional Spaceport, Upham, New Mexico. Based on comments received during the scoping period and the advancement of the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), the FAA may propose additional suborbital rocket concepts, propellant types, and locations for impacts analysis.
Under the proposed action, the FAA assumes that up to 50 launch and landing events per concept would occur annually, and no more than 100 annual launch and landing events would occur at any one location. The proposed action assumes that no new infrastructure (e.g., buildings, runways, launch pads) would be required. Therefore, infrastructure construction and use are not included in the scope of the PEIS.
Other than the proposed action and no action alternative, the FAA does not have any defined alternatives to consider, at this time. Based on the comments received during the scoping period and the advancement of the NPRM, the FAA may consider additional alternatives based on its discretion in implementing the CSLAA. The FAA will assess the alternatives in accordance with the CEQ NEPA regulations (40 CFR 1502.14.).
The preliminary list of potential environmental issues that may be analyzed in the PEIS includes the following:
- Air Quality
- Water Resources
- Biological Resources
- Public Health and Safety
- Socioeconomics
- Cultural Resources
- Environmental Justice
