COCOA — If SpaceX’s Starship and Super Heavy finds a home on the Space Coast, what would be the most powerful orbital rocket ever to launch is certain to have a significant environmental impact.

For a pair of potential sites within Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, the process to figure out exactly what that will be has begun, starting with a set of in-person and virtual meetings for the public to comment on concerns of frequent launches of a rocket twice as powerful as the Saturn V rockets from the Apollo program.

The first of those meetings brought out a few hundred curious residents to the Catherine Schweinsberg Rood Central Cocoa Library on Tuesday night.

“The point of these meetings today and this week, is to get as many members of the public — it can be any members of the public: residents, researchers, teachers, it really doesn’t matter, everyone — to come here, in person or online or emailed their comments, concerns, questions, pretty much anything about this process,” said Emre Kelly, media operations chief for Space Launch Delta 45, the Space Force group that oversees the launch sites.

The meetings are the first step in what is expected to be about a 15-month process to complete an Environment Impact Statement headed up by the Department of the Air Force. The Space Force falls under the Air Force in the same way that Marines fall under the Navy.

The goal of the EIC, which was announced in February, is to determine if the Air Force will go into a lease agreement to either take over the existing Space Launch Complex 37, create a new Space Launch Complex 50 or do nothing.

SLC 37 is currently home to United Launch Alliance’s Delta IV Heavy launches, but the last of those rockets is slated to fly by this summer, after which ULA is expected to give up its lease. A new SLC 50 would be built on undeveloped land between SLC 40, where SpaceX launches Falcon 9 rockets, and SLC 37.

Representatives from the Space Force, Federal Aviation Administration, NASA and the Coast Guard were stationed about with placards describing the where, why and next steps in the process.

Members of the public wandered in at a pretty steady stream during the three-hour event to ask questions about the plans.

“They have a lot of work to do,” said John Boerlin who came with his two adult sons Tom and Greg, all from Merritt Island. “I expected probably more detail about the vehicle and that kind of stuff, but it’s early.”

“I feel good about it,” Tom Boerlin added, noting he sleeps through the more frequent sonic booms SpaceX’s current rocket launches sometimes produce. “I think SpaceX has a good record. I think if anyone can build a big rocket like that successfully. Right now, they’re ahead of the game. So I don’t see any problems.”

The second meeting was scheduled for Wednesday (March 6) from from 4-7 p.m. at the Titusville Civic Center followed by Thursday, March 7 from 4-7 p.m. at the Radisson Resort at The Port in Cape Canaveral. A virtual meeting is also planned on March 12 that will be recorded and available through March 22, according to the website at spaceforcestarshipeis.com.

Anyone onsite can leave written comments or get access to leave them online. Comments will be incorporated into the draft version of the EIS that’s targeted for release in December.

“Then there are more meetings again after that,” Kelly said. “So obviously, it’s incredibly important that anyone who has any thoughts about this officially comments, and they don’t have to give their name or address or anything like that. Obviously, the important thing to note, it’s public record once they do.”

The final version of the EIC, the most intensive regulatory watchdog option under the National Environmental Policy Act, is expected to be released in summer 2025 with the preferred launch site alternative. Only after that could SpaceX venture into any sort of new launch site agreement.

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SpaceX for now uses its Starbase launch site in Boca Chica, Texas, for its Starship and Super Heavy launch attempts. The rocket can generate more than 17 million pounds of thrust on liftoff.

The first two in 2023 ended with explosions, although the last in November did manage to make it to space. A third attempt is awaiting FAA approval to launch and could come later this month.

SpaceX had been building out a launch tower to support Starship launches from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Pad 39-A as well, but the company has stated that it wants multiple launch sites to support hundreds and then thousands of Starship launches a year.

So while the KSC launch pad may eventually see the Starship as well, but that’s up to NASA. This EIC is specifically tailored for Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

“This is between Air Force/Space Force and SpaceX,” Kelly said.