LEHIGH VALLEY, Pa. – NASA has awarded a $57 million contract to Air Products to supply liquid hydrogen to Marshall Space Flight Center and other agency facilities including Stennis Space Center in Bay St. Louis, Miss.
Liquid hydrogen, when combined with liquid oxygen, is used to fuel cryogenic rocket engines. Its unique properties support the development of aeronautics.
The $57 million is part of several NASA contracts totaling $130 million for Air Products to provide liquid hydrogen to other agency facilities, including Kennedy Space Center and the nearby Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. That multi-year contract, which is already in effect, includes a maximum value of approximately $75 million.
“Air Products has a long history of working with NASA, stretching from the very beginning of the United States’ space program to the Apollo 11 moon landing, and to the more recent missions to study Mars,” said Francesco Maione, Air Products’ president in the Americas. “We are proud to provide NASA with the industrial gases they need for their important work and look forward to continuing our many decades-long working relationship with the U.S. space program.”
Air Products’ working relationship with NASA began in 1957 with an industrial gas plant in Ohio. The company has since continuously supplied NASA with liquid hydrogen and other industrial gases.
In addition to product supply to space launches, Air Products has had a long-term relationship with NASA’s engine testing program at Marshall, Stennis, and the Johnson Space Center in Texas.
Air Products work includes production, distribution, storage and dispensing.
The company has announced a commitment to invest at least $15 billion for clean energy megaprojects around the world and additional projects that include a $4 billion joint venture with AES to build the largest green hydrogen production facility in the United States in Texas, and a green liquid hydrogen production facility in Arizona that will produce 10 metric tons of green hydrogen a day.
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