Can China’s electric rocket launcher make Musk’s chemical rockets obsolete?
China has successfully tested a high-temperature superconducting system for an electromagnetic rocket launcher, aiming to reduce fuel consumption during lift-off. This development follows China's recent achievement in reusable rocket booster recovery, signaling a potential challenge to SpaceX's dominance.
Why it matters
Advancements in electromagnetic launch technology could fundamentally change the economics of space travel by reducing the reliance on chemical propellants.
On July 10, China’s Long March 10B placed its payload into orbit before its first-stage booster returned to Earth and was captured by a net on an offshore platform. It was China’s first controlled recovery of an orbital-class rocket booster, making it only the second country after the United States to achieve the feat.The recovery brought China closer to the reusable-rocket model pioneered commercially by Elon Musk’s SpaceX. But another Chinese experiment points to a more radical ambition: reducing the need for rockets to burn vast quantities of fuel during lift-off.In late March, a research facility in Ziyang, a city near the Tibetan Plateau, successfully tested a high-temperature superconducting navigation system.
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