EUROPE’S ANSWER IS ARIANE 6

Behind the buzz made by one of our competitors about reusable launch vehicles, the economic equation is not that simple to solve. What about the performance loss, the refurbishing costs of the recovered stage, the lower production rates, and the reliability in case of reuse ? No answers yet. In the current context, Europe’s response to the changing space market is called Ariane 6, together with her little sister Vega C. Available from 2020 from our Kourou spaceport, Ariane 6 is based on technical features that made the success and reliability of its predecessor, Ariane 5, while halving the cost. The new launcher will be highly modular, with a heavy version for launching large telecommunication satellites to geostationary transfer orbits, as well as a medium-lift version for European institutional satellites. But this is only the beginning : in due course, Ariane 6 shall benefit from a Lox-Methane engine, called Prométhée, already being studied by CNES and Airbus Safran Launchers teams, in partnership with the German space agency DLR. Prométhée will be ten times cheaper than Ariane’s main stage engine Vulcain… and potentially reusable. Ariane 6 marks the beginning of an unprecedented innovation cycle for future European launchers. For one thing is certain : the lower the costs of space access will be, the more launches will be required to enable steadily-increasing space services, for the greatest benefit of Earthlings.