Methalox rocket

A methalox rocket is a spacecraft which is propelled by a rocket motor using methane and oxygen (methalox) as its fuel. Methalox is also sometimes referred to as "LOX." Methalox has been described as the "fuel of the future" due to the likelihood that both methane and oxygen will be able to be extracted, processed, and stored for later use in such off-Earth locations as on the surface of the Moon or on Mars. Eventually such capabilities of such off-Earth rocket fuel production in such remote locations could act to roughly halve the fuel carrying capacity requirements of any round trip missions to any such off-Earth locations. By enabling the spacecrafts used on such missions to be refueled by "locally produced fuel" prior to departing on the return legs of their missions, any such missions would only need to carry roughly half as much fuel on their outbound legs.

Early NASA 2006 testing of methalox combustion for later methalox rocket engine production.

History

• On July 12, 2023 the Chinese company LandSpace launched its Zhuque-2 methalox rocket. The Zhuque-2 was the world's first "non-reusable" methalox rocket to successfully deliver a payload capable rocket to low Earth orbit. (The earlier Zhuque-1 rocket series had not employed a methalox propulsion system.)

• On February 21, 2024 Intuitive Machine's spaceship Nova-C became the first spaceship to use a methalox propulsion system to successfully navigate between two celestial bodies, the Earth and the Moon.

• On June 6, 2024 SpaceX successfully launched the world's first "reusable" payload capable methalox rocket into low Earth orbit, which was SpaceX's 4th test flight of its Starship rocket. The reusable SpaceX Starship rocket system is currently designed with the intention of delivering materials and humans to both the surface of the Moon and to Mars.

See also

• Spacecraft propulsion
• Rocket propulsion technologies (disambiguation)