Elon Musk is continuing his push into the Southern U.S. with SpaceX, his aerospace and tech conglomerate, planning a $100 billion launch facility in Louisiana.
In a joint statement, the Louisiana Economic Development office said on Tuesday that SpaceX will establish its Starbase in Vermilion Parish, Louisiana, at a former Exxon property to, "support thousands of launches annually."
SpaceX stock rose about 2% to close at $137.95.
Once built, Starbase, LA will serve as the main launch facility for Starship, SpaceX's in-development rocket that's the largest ever built and designed to be fully reusable.
Musk has aspirations to massively expand SpaceX's Starlink satellite network, to launch orbital data centers and to someday colonize Mars. Those ambitions, and justification for SpaceX's nearly $2 trillion market cap, hinge on the success of Starship.
SpaceX said, in a video posted to its website on Tuesday, that the search for a site to build launch pads and have access to ample fuel for its operations took about seven years. Musk said in the video that the company would bring "probably 10,000 really exciting jobs" to Louisiana with the spaceport.
A fact sheet posted online by the state of Louisiana said SpaceX is expected to generate an estimated "3,000 direct new jobs over the next 10 years" in the state, and "8,100 indirect new jobs."
SpaceX said it would work on a "historic coastal restoration" in Louisiana, in partnership with the state to "bring the marsh back" and ensure the wetlands around its new facility will have "storm protection."
Earlier this year, Republican Governor Jeff Landry signed bills, that became law in May, exempting some aerospace projects in Louisiana from public review, and making unauthorized entry into a spaceport a felony. They also offered financial incentives to aerospace manufacturers.
SpaceX previously faced community backlash, lawsuits and fines following environmental violations at its first Starbase facility in Boca Chica, Texas, in the company town now known as Starbase.
In its first test flight of Starship in April 2023 in Texas, energy from the rocket caused SpaceX's concrete launchpad to explode and its spacecraft to blow up in midair. Chunks of concrete were flung into a nesting and migration site important to some endangered species and a fire chewed through around 4 acres of Boca Chica State Park Land south of the Texas launchpad.
In 2024, SpaceX was also found to have violated the Clean Water Act at the Texas launch facility by repeatedly releasing pollutants into or near bodies of water in Texas, a state agency said in a notice of violation focused on its water deluge system.
SpaceX's work in Louisiana follows Musk's move from California into Texas, Tennessee and Mississippi. The company said Louisiana was its fourth launch site.
Musk's AI venture, now known as SpaceXAI, built out its Colossus data centers and a power plant in Greater Memphis. Before that, Musk relocated the headquarters of his automaker, Tesla, from California to Austin, Texas. Tesla now operates a massive vehicle assembly plant in Austin and is testing its driverless, Robotaxi service and Cybercab vehicles in the region.
Tesla and SpaceX, in partnership with Intel, also plan to build a massive AI chip factory in Grimes County, Texas.
