Groundbreaking biofuel rocket could be 'Uber for space'

"We want to prove that a bio-derived fuel can serve just as well, if not better in some cases, than traditional fuels to power rockets and payloads to space," he says. Because it's relatively cheap to fly and doesn't need the high-tech infrastructure of larger rockets, it will help make space research accessible to more people. "Right now there are freight trains to space like SpaceX and ULA - and there are buses to space, like medium size rockets," says Deri. "They're taking thousands of kilograms to space. But there's no space launch service allowing one or two payloads to go to space. There's no Uber to space. We want to be the Uber service to space." Maine is geographically suited to such launches which makes it attractive to the growing space satellite communication industry, says Terry Shehata, executive director of Maine Space Grant Consortium which is funded by the US space agency Nasa.

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