[Stephen Clark] Fuel supply is a bottleneck for Starship—here’s how SpaceX will get around it

It takes more than 200 tanker trucks traveling from distant refineries to deliver all of the methane, liquid oxygen, and liquid nitrogen for a Starship launch. SpaceX officials recognize this is not an efficient means of conveying these commodities to the launch pad. It takes time, emits pollution, and clogs roadways. The sole two-lane highway leading to Starbase from nearby Brownsville, Texas, is riddled with potholes and cracks in the pavement from overuse by heavy trucks.

SpaceX's solution to some of these problems is to build its own plants to generate cryogenic fluids. The company recently received approval from local authorities to build an air separation plant across the highway just north of the Starbase launch pads. Construction of the plant began this summer. Once operational, this facility will take in air, condense it, and separate it into oxygen and nitrogen. The resulting liquid oxygen and liquid nitrogen will flow about 1,000 feet through a pipeline into ground storage tanks at the launch site.

But the air separation plant will only partially solve the propellant bottleneck. SpaceX still needs methane to fuel the 39 (eventually 42) Raptor engines that power the rocket's Super Heavy booster and Starship upper stage. The answer to this problem is a pair of methane liquefaction facilities to convert natural gas—initially delivered by truck or a future pipeline—into pure liquid methane, and eventually, a methane generation plant co-located with Starbase's dual launch pads.