“Rocket fuel is made up of liiquid hydrogen and liguid oxygen ...this doesn’t burn like petrochemicals which produce mainly carbon monoxide and contribute to carbon pollution.”
The shuttles main engines (integral to the shuttle) are liquid hydrogen / liquid oxygen fueled. So you’re right about that.
The solid boosters, on the other hand, burned Ammonium Perchlorate Composite Propellant (APCP), which is fairly dirty stuff. I’m glad to see them retired, really. However, they didn’t produce much CO2 at all, for whatever that’s worth.
The irony regarding this article is that SpaceX is going to take over a good deal of the heavy lift rocketry business in the absence of the shuttle, and its designs are powered by kerosene and LO2. So, the retirement of the space shuttles in fact means MORE, not less, fossil fuel will be burned getting material into earth orbit, generating lots of nice plant food (CO2).
Like many environuts, the one who wrote this article is clueless.
Yea, but it is not coal or nuclear so it is ok.