Interview with Matthew Travis of Aphelion Aerospace on Why He Joined and Signed a Climate Pact

Hello everyone. My name is Ian Peterman, host of Conscious Design Podcast. And with me today is Matthew Travis of Affiliate Aerospace. Welcome to the show.

Thank you for having me. I'm glad to be here.

Yeah. So I'm, I'm really excited to have you on because you are, you're tackling a space that not many people are trying to in creating green. You know, your website says green, low-cost, on-demand launch services, which is, as we all know, the space industry is growing and people are becoming more aware of how ungreen it is. So it's, it's nice to see that you guys are, are jumping ahead and trying to create something that is more green in this space. Can you tell me, share a little bit about how you came about? What made you guys decide that you wanted a rocket company, but you wanted a green one?

Sure, I'll give you a little bit of history on that. Originally, when we first got started, we were looking at some of the conventional technologies that, you know, basically every other company uses. It seemed to be, you know, proven through decades of, you know, basically rocket launches. And then, you know, we started out looking at our business model and how we could lower our costs, lower our risk, lower the hazard level to our own people. And as we did that, we started looking at some of these alternative chemical fuels. And it was a pretty challenging process. We went through, you know, a couple concepts, and, you know, there were either problems with high cost or manufacturing and handling challenges. And we did a lot of research into what has been done within the U.S. government, as well as some private organization research like Sandia National Labs over the— and we did find some options that met our goals as a business in terms of cost and flexibility, reliability, but were also environmentally friendly. They called— they call it non-toxic non-toxic, green. There's an actual term NASA uses. So, you know, that started to become attractive to us. And the more we went down this road, the more we saw that, you know, not only is it much more environmentally friendly, it's about— it's about as clean as you can get. But it also makes good business sense. And that was kind of a light bulb moment. You know, a lot of people think that, oh, if you are going to be green, then, you know, your costs are going to go way up, or, you know, things like that. And in reality, you can go green and actually have a better business case. And so once we realized that, you know, we just went full steam ahead. steam ahead, and we've maintained that focus since, and we've expanded it to our entire business operations.

Yeah, I heard you guys swapped from plastic bottled water to some more sustainable options. So it's, it kind of starts to go through your entire operations and shift the mindset. It's great because it is such a misconception that You know, green is terribly expensive and not smart business-wise. So it's, it's great that you guys were able to connect the lines and, and identify a way to do it in a smart business way and, and also green at the same time. So you guys, as part of being green, you mentioned that you guys are signing a climate pact. becoming a part of that. Can you explain a little bit, like, what is that? What does that entail?

What are your—

kind of what are the metrics? What got you guys into that?

Sure. So I actually happened across the Climate PACT just through my news feed. And so I looked into it a little more. started by Amazon, more and more companies are jumping on board. And what this requires is, one, the goal of being carbon neutral by, I believe it's 2035, although we'll be able to get there far before, far earlier than that. And then it also requires regular reporting and auditing of every aspect of our manufacturing and operations. So basically, from when the raw materials are dug out of the earth until we deploy a satellite, we have to track our emissions and our carbon footprint every step of the way and then report that. Yeah, and that'll be public reporting, uh, as well.

So you guys have, have internally are also Publishing publicly, this is what we're doing. This is the life of the iron ore as it goes from Earth to space.

That is correct. It is a public disclosure and full transparency. And last I checked, we are the only— this may have changed by now, but we are the only company in the space industry that is making this Yeah, you guys are—

I've followed this aerospace industry since I could read, basically, and it's never been an area that I've seen any companies, until you guys, that have really pushed anything close to, we want to be sustainable, we want to be green, we want to think about those things. very much, well, we can do it cheaper, we can do it cheaper, we can do it faster. And those have been kind of the two modes. So yeah, I think, I think you guys are the only ones really, really doing it. Hopefully there'll be more. Hopefully you're not the only for too long. Hopefully there's, there's others.

Yeah, I think there will be more, um, and more and more as time goes on. Uh, you know, there's a big push to Get away from hydrocarbons, um, you know, and, and fossil fuels. And that is a big thing for us. You know, our, our rocket technology, our propulsion system does not utilize any hydrocarbons. Well, it utilizes hydrocarbons, but not petroleum or fossil fuels. Um, it's actually hard to, uh, unless you're using liquid oxygen or liquid hydrogen, you aren't going to be using it. a hydrocarbon in some form. Um, but ours right now, the, the gold standard is liquid oxygen and methane propulsion. Uh, that has a very low carbon emissions, CO2 emissions. We're actually better than that. Um, the only, the only propulsion technology that has zero carbon output is liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. But that is so expensive, uh, that it is not— that it's not cost-effective for a company like us, or for really most companies.

Right, that's a—

that's a—

too liquid. That's very expensive just to have it and keep it liquid.

And extremely dangerous as well. So that's another, another focus for us is, you know, safety and reliability. You know, so for example, our oxidizer and our fuel can be stored in commercial-grade containers that they're shipped in. They can be stored indefinitely. They can be transported across the interstates with minimal hazmat type of certifications and handling and insurance. So all that drives down costs and increases our reliability. It increases safety and it's environmentally friendly as well. Um, if, for example, our oxidizer— if we have an accident and it leaks everywhere, the way we clean it up is just hose it down. That is actually the, uh, standard recommended method of cleanup.

So there's no hazmat suit.

Exactly, exactly.

Oh, that's awesome, that's awesome. You can just wash your Watch your oxygen out. Um, so you're— you talked about the chemical side. As you're going through this process of joining the Climate Pact, is there other areas besides that that you guys are really— you mentioned operations side, but other, other materials part of your rockets that you're shifting? What those are, because you're having to report, you're figuring out, you know, everything that happens between ore and— Or in launch. So is there, is there other areas that you weren't really focused on, but now you've, through this process, have noticed like, oh, there's these other areas that we can change and shift as well to be able to meet your carbon neutral goals?

Sure. One area operationally is making sure that we do not leave any debris in orbit after we launch a satellite.

Super important.

And yes, so when a satellite is deployed from the rocket, from the upper stage— there's usually 2 or 3 stages on a rocket— that final stage also reaches orbital velocity. That's because the satellite has to get to orbital velocity, right? So what we do— other companies do this, but not everybody— And foreign entities don't do this as much either. We make sure that every part of our rocket comes back to Earth after deploying the satellite. And, um, the upper stage is small enough and light enough that it will burn up in the atmosphere, which you think, oh, that's— what about the carbon output of that? The structure is mainly aluminum, um, and so it vaporizes and there's minimal environmental impact. For the first stage, we are designing it to be reusable, kind of like the Falcon 9 first stage.

So, okay.

When its job is done, it will fly back, really glide back to Earth and do a powered landing, you know, specified zone, whether it's a boat or land. And so we will not be throwing away the first stage in the ocean. So I explained this, why this is a big deal. Um, over the last, I guess it's now 70 years of launches out of Cape Canaveral, there have been thousands and thousands of launches. If you drained the ocean off of Cape Canaveral, you would see a littered field of rocket debris. And while, you know, some life forms like to use that as like artificial reefs and whatnot, it is litter. And that is a concern for us as well. We don't—

it's still garbage.

It's still—

even with a positive spin.

It is still garbage. And we don't need to be dirtying up the ocean floors any more than we already have either. And so looking longer term, right now we're in a facility that, that we've leased out. We'll be here for the next 2, 3 years maybe, but eventually we will be building our own dedicated manufacturing and research facility. We're already looking at land for that, as a matter of fact. When we do that, we will obviously, hopefully obviously, make sure we are LEED certified. But the design and construction of the building, my goal is to make sure that it is 100%, you know, carbon neutral, if not carbon negative. So, for example, utilizing solar power, being decentralized with our power, and potentially even generating more electricity than we use, and then we could put that back into the grid and actually have a really good carbon offset just from that. But, you know, it's going to come down to our choices of building materials, the location, for example. We don't want to— well, if we were in Florida, we'd probably have to drain a wetland to build on. We don't want to do that.

Right.

You know, let's not harm the animals either. So really, it's a whole-of-operations approach to meeting the challenges of climate change. It's not just one area or another. It does include recycling. It doesn't— as you mentioned, it includes buying You know, large bottles of water instead of the little 16-ounce ones. All of that has an impact, but we really have to look at it, you know, with a whole-of-operations perspective and see how everything fits together and plays together.

Right. Well, it's also— you're thinking about, you know, making a carbon-negative R&D location, because that's— I, I'm assuming that facility is gonna be pretty, pretty large. Since it's rockets, right? So you're not just a small little, you know, space. You're talking about a pretty, pretty big facility to be carbon negative. That's great. I'd love to follow you guys and see where you guys land in a few years. That's an undertaking just in its own, let alone the rockets themselves.

Very true. Very true. One of the advantages we have Over a lot of other companies is we can tackle this problem from a clean sheet. We don't need to retrofit or things like that. We can design it from all of our facilities. We can design from the ground up in an optimal way.

Yeah.

So that goes to issues like for HVAC, what building materials and insulation materials do we use? Because that affects a lot, the power requirements for your air conditioning and your furnace and everything else. Um, and if it were an existing building like we're in now, basically we'd have to gut the whole place and retrofit, and then that's not cost-effective as a business and probably wouldn't be sustainable as a business, right? Uh, when you get to, when you get to do this from a clean sheet, you have a lot more options, I think, a lot more options than, uh, than, you know, than if you had existing facilities and operations.

Yeah, retrofits are always— they seem to be more expensive because then you get into it and you, especially older buildings, and you find out there's some hazardous material that was used in the '50s to build it, and then it's, it's a whole different Game very quickly to retrofit. So, well, that, that was great. Um, you mentioned too, so your board of advisors, you guys are growing pretty well. So obviously the green is, is great and it's, it's there, but you're also pulling in some really great people to be involved to help make, make sure that it's operational and that the rocket does what it's supposed to do when it's supposed to. Can you share a little about who's involved and who's taking notice of you guys?

Sure thing. Because, you know, at the end of the day, the bottom line is, we do have to be a business that is profitable. So we do have to have, you know, our operations, our technologies, our sales, marketing, our management, you know, we need to address all of those areas as well. So we do have a good board of advisors, which we are continually working to expand. And our 3 core advisors right now, uh, the first is, uh, Edward Mango. He, uh, is former, uh, NASA Commercial Crew Program Manager. So all of the SpaceX launches with Crew Dragon, uh, he got the ball rolling and advocated and got the initial contracts. for all of that back when he was still with NASA. So he has a good, a good perspective on how public-private sector partnerships can work. Prior to that, he was Assistant Space Shuttle Launch Director. So the space shuttle launch team was hundreds of people and then thousands supporting them. And he worked and led in that environment. to ensure safe operations with the space shuttle, especially after the Columbia accident. And then he worked alongside— technically worked for— Mike Leinbach, who was the space shuttle launch director. So he managed the entire launch team and interfaced with the contractor team because it was half NASA civil servants, half United Space Alliance, private company. So he led a team of several thousand. He is also just about, hopefully, to sign formally to join our board of advisors. Ed and I have been working on him to get us— to get him to join us. He's real interested. And then just a few days ago, Mr.— actually, yeah, Mr. Kevin Rice, joined our board of advisors, and he spent 20 years at Lockheed Martin Skunk Works managing their business operations. And after he left Lockheed Martin, he went to JPL in the same capacity, business management and operations, as well as business development. And he was brought on board JPL Shortly after several high-profile NASA missions, including 2 Mars missions, failed because essentially operations and management had become dysfunctional. So they brought him on board to essentially rebuild their operations organization. And since his work at JPL, The results of that have been adopted by NASA agency-wide. All of the centers— Kennedy Space Center, Johnson, etc.— they have all adopted the principles and practices that he put in place. And since then, not a single— as far as I know, not a single JPL mission has failed. There may be one out there that I haven't heard about, but their track record has been exemplary, really due to Mr. Rice's work. And so—

Really?

We're not that— we're not the size of JPL, but he is excited to be on our board and help us out, which is important because we want to make sure that as we build out the business and the operations, that we do it right from the beginning. We don't want, you know, 3 years down the road to realize we need to completely reorganize the business. So his experience and expertise is really valuable as well.

That's awesome. Yeah, doing it right the first time is always better. Yes, avoiding, avoiding the pitfalls that other people have gone through can help, help with that.

Well, that's a That's amazing.

That's some serious talent that's interested in what you guys are doing, which is great. Are you guys kind of— what is your plan? Like, where do you want the company? Obviously launch satellites, but do you have future ambitions or other goals that you're weaving in? Carbon neutral.

Mm-hmm.

Before 2035, obviously, but where else do you see this going? Kind of what's your future goal with this?

Obviously grow as a business. That's the obvious one. We all like that. Beyond just our small vertically launched rocket, we do have goals and visions to expand the technology, to larger vehicles, to winged vehicles, like a horizontal takeoff space plane, as it were. You know, and, you know, you never know, maybe human spaceflight in the future, although that would be probably way in the future as far as we're concerned at this early stage for us. But then extending this clean technology, not just to the, to the launch vehicle, but to the spacecraft that are launched on it. So for example, a lot of satellites right now utilize hydrazine and nitrogen tetroxide for their onboard propulsion. One of those will give you cancer quite readily. The other one will kill you within seconds if you're exposed to it. Not really, not really ideal.

2-for-1 deal.

Yeah, I know, right? So that's not really ideal. There are better alternatives to that. Additionally, for like Mars missions or deep space missions, usually the last major propulsive boost to get the satellite away from Earth is provided by a solid-fueled rocket motor. So instead of liquids, it's a solid. Very dirty. It's Hazardous to process, not as efficient. So we think we can replace all of those with our technology as it matures. So essentially have end-to-end a clean, relatively safe and reliable system.

And then you're looking to scale your system to be able to do the small thrusters all the way to—

Exactly.

Big boost, basically.

Exactly. And, um, the timeline for this would be looking at, uh, initially, uh, we're putting a line of CubeSats. Little— if you don't know what CubeSat is, it's, uh, 10-centimeter cubes filled with electronics and, you know, the payload. And then they can be stacked and assembled in different configurations. So you can have one of these, 3 of them together, 6, 12, up to 54, uh, to get increasing capabilities. So we'll be getting those on the market, uh, we believe by the end of the year actually, which is— we were talking about this last week and we realized we have the capability to do it. Uh, so—

So your own CubeSats?

So you're— Yes.

You guys are developing? I got it.

Yes. We're also licensing some more advanced technology from NASA And then that'll— those are more for deep space type of missions that we'll be able to sell and also launch. And then the small thrusters for in-space propulsion, those should be on the market in about a year, if not sooner. A lot of this is funding dependent, of course. And then our first orbital launch, we're looking at 2024. Again, funding dependent. If we have enough funding, we'd probably accelerate that by maybe 6 months to a year.

So you guys are— you guys aren't that far then. You're, you're actually pretty close to those being ready to go if you're 12 months out. You know, that's, that's pretty, that's pretty fast in terms of development time.

Yeah, the, the, the fundamental technologies And, you know, new technologies that we're developing, that's already behind us. We've actually been working on it for a couple years or so. So we have conducted full-scale hot fire testing of one of our engine modules, for example. So we are pretty far along in, in, in those terms.

Got it.

We're getting to the point where it's actually going to be more about manufacturing than inventing, right? So we don't need to invent a new rocket airframe. That's pretty known how to do that. You know, you roll your aluminum and bolt it together, weld it together, whatever. Uh, so, but the, the propulsion system in particular required inventing new technologies. Uh, but again, that's behind us at this point. Awesome.

And you guys are— we chat a little bit— you guys are doing a crowdfund raise on StartEngine, correct?

That is correct. Uh, simultaneous with our private equity placement, uh, standard traditional VC type funding, we have, uh, opened a round on StartEngine, uh, that opened up a short time ago and, uh, We did that. One, it obviously gets us some cash flow, but it also opens up what we're doing to the, to the wider public, because everybody loves space. Everybody wants to be a part of it, even if it's just owning stock in a company. You know, they want to be a part of it, want to feel that ownership. And so we are raising on StartEngine. That is ongoing. Just look for Athenean Aerospace on StartEngine and, uh, and, you know, everybody can check it out. Um, and speaking of stock, I guess, uh, we'll give a shout out to, uh, one of our competitors. But I have friends over there, over at Astra, who made it to orbit for the first time a couple days ago.

Awesome.

And I noticed their stock shot up 44% because of it, which was Must be a good feeling. Must be a good feeling for those folks over there. So congratulations to them. It's good for them, but it's also good for our entire industry. It gives us all more credibility at what we're trying to do.

Right. Yeah, it's still such a, such a young— the commercial side, right? It's still such a young industry. It's— those wins are good for everyone. Shows, shows, it shows it's actually working. It's happening. It's not— it's worth investing in, which—

Absolutely. You know, any billionaire can throw enough money at it and build a rocket. That's not difficult. But for companies like us, you know, since we don't have a billionaire— wish we did. We all wish we did. Yeah, right. It is a lot more challenging for all of the companies like us And there are a number of them, you know, working hard. So anytime one of us has a measure of success, it shows everybody else that yes, it's actually doable, it's feasible, and it can be profitable. However, we're the one— we're the ones who are being green about it.

Yes, that, that you guys have cornered that market for now. Hopefully, hopefully other people will pick up on it, but It's a great, great thing for you guys to have now, which is, which is good. We need, we need more of it.

Uh, absolutely.

Perfect. Well, this has been great chatting with you and, and being able to learn more and have you share about what you guys are doing. Is there— and we'll make sure there'll be links in, in description and everything for your crowd— crowdfunding, uh, website. We'll make sure everything's there so anybody that wants to invest a little, a little bit and get it, get a piece, a share of you guys and help you guys keep doing this, um, they'll be able to do that. And is there anything else you want to share or shout out to?

Uh, let's see. Um, sure. Uh, first I invite everybody to, uh, follow us on our social media channels. We do have our Facebook page, our Twitter account. We're on Instagram, LinkedIn, and our YouTube channel. You can just search for Athelian Aerospace on there, and of course visit our website. You know, and follow along with what we're doing. We will be having some exciting news in the coming few. months. We're going to be doing additional rocket engine test fires up at our partner Frontier Astronautics in Wyoming. So shout out to Frontier and their owner Tim Bendell. He's been a great supporter of us and we're thrilled that he's working with us. A shout out also to Dan Moser and Compositex. Uh, in Utah. They are manufacturing some of our engine components for us, so they are also critical to what we're doing, and we appreciate the work that they're doing for us as well. Awesome.

Well, for anyone that wants to follow, we'll have links, social media and everything, in the description. Follow, buy some shares, help, help fund this, and And yeah, really been great having you on, Matthew. I really appreciate your time being on the podcast.

Oh, I love it. And hopefully, uh, at some point in the not too distant future, I— you might want to invite me back on when we have even more good stuff to share.

Oh, would love to. Would love to have a follow-up to this with you guys having, uh, more, more things happening. So appreciate it.

Absolutely.