European Heavy Lift Launcher Feasibility Study

Josef Aschbacher certainly does not have an easy job. Since taking office on March 1, 2021, the ESA Director General has been working flat out to restructure the European Space Agency. After all, its rigidity and sometimes stubbornness have caused it to fall behind in international comparison. This is most evident in the field of astronautics. For example, there is currently neither an operational European spacecraft nor a rocket capable of launching it into space. In general, access to space is already severely limited and will become even more so in the near future. Ariane 5 has only one flight left before it is retired. It will be replaced by Ariane 6, which is still far from operational. Moreover, it is neither cheap in terms of development nor launch costs, let alone reusable.

European spaceflight's back is against the wall

This is where years of mistaken belief that there is neither the technology nor the market for reusable rockets comes back to haunt us. Meanwhile, SpaceX has proven otherwise, creating a virtual monopoly on low-cost launches. At the latest since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine and the associated loss of Russian capacity, Europe's back is against the wall. Micro-launchers, which can carry a payload of about one ton into orbit, are intended to remedy the situation. As part of the payload competition initiated by DLR, three companies - HyImpulse, Isar Aerospace and the Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA) - received funding, with Isar Aerospace and RFA each receiving 11 million euros. All three have scheduled their first flights for the end of 2023; HyImpulse will initially launch a sounding rocket as a technology demonstrator.

Ariane 6 to slow for Space Race 2.0

However, despite the high launch cadences planned (about one launch per week), there will not be enough capacity to provide sovereign European access to space. However, micro launchers are designed to deliver small payloads to low earth orbit. But to launch large satellites or probes to geostationary orbit or beyond, powerful launchers are required. They are also essential for space missions. From this point of view, Ariane 6 will certainly find its place and thus have a certain raison d'être. But it needs more to compete in the current Space Race 2.0.

ESA seems to be well aware of this and launched the Future Launchers Preparatory Program (FLPP) in 2003. The FLPP is designed to support projects in the areas of propulsion, materials and processes, reusability, structures and mechanisms, avionics and guidance and navigation control (GNC), and end-to-end systems and missions. But it seems to have been in no hurry over the last twenty years, pointing out directly on its website that development cycles of a decade are quite normal.

Rocket Factory Augsburg and Arianespace Commissioned with Feasibility Study for European Heavy Lift Launcher

Numerous NewSpace startups prove that things can be done much faster. And at least the feasibility study for the development of a fully reusable heavy-lift launcher is on a tight schedule. The contracts that ESA has signed with Arianespace and Rocket Factory Augsburg run until the end of September 2023. The space agency writes that the study will assess the feasibility and identify the key technologies needed to develop a European heavy-lift launcher. The European Heavy Lift Launcher (EHLL) is designed to deliver high-cadence payloads into space at low cost. A point for which the planned reusability is indispensable today.

Atypical for a heavy-lift launcher, the EHLL will initially be optimized for missions into low Earth orbit (LEO). Minimizing environmental impact is also a key focus. The EU's Green Deal calls for greenhouse gas emissions to be reduced to 55 percent of 1990 levels by 2030. By 2050, the EU wants to be a climate-neutral continent.