More than $7 million in recently approved state funding aims to help SpaceX expand Cape Canaveral facilities to increase its local launch rate and potentially bring hundreds of jobs to the area.
The board of Space Florida, the agency in charge of growing the state's aerospace business, has approved $7.3 million for the infrastructure upgrades.
Up to $2.3 million will help transition a former Delta II hangar for processing Falcon 9 rockets.
Another $5 million will aid construction of a new payload integration and encapsulation facility near the Falcon 9 pad at Launch Complex 40.
SpaceX, which is said to be investing significantly more in the projects, has aggressive plans to launch monthly from the Cape by 2015. Twenty Cape launches are currently under contract, including 13 for NASA.
Space Florida, which has not publicly identified SpaceX as the beneficiary of the investments, expects an increased launch rate to generate 400 new jobs over several years.
Space news and analysis from Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral 
3 comments:
That works out to a maximum of $18,200 per job in a realistic (but not counting economic benefits to the region from the paychecks) scenario.
I wish it were that cost-effective for the rest of the country (multiplied by a million or so).
This is good news for Florida.
Minor nit ... SpaceX is at LC-40, not 41.
Stephen: Thanks for pointing out the LC typo, now corrected.
Post a Comment