A viable and sustainable European path into space – for cargo and astronauts

Abstract

A think tank of DLR space-research institutes and ArianeGroup reflected on the launcher perspectives, broadening the mission capabilities for European access to space including human mission towards LEO, supporting potential future commercial markets. The Ariane 6 launcher is to be evolved with perspective of enhanced versatility and reduced costs. Also, a new generation of modern, high-performance launchers is to be prepared that is capable of serving all major missions relevant to Europe. The paper summarizes major results of preliminary technical design studies performed in Germany, both for a future Ariane 6 evolution including astronaut transport to and from LEO and for the next generation of partially reusable concepts. Return of the RLV is pondering options of powered descent and vertical landing and smart winged return technologies with horizontal landing close to the launch site. The main propulsion system is considering LOX-LH2 in different cycle architectures as well as LOX-LCH4 of the ongoing PROMETHEUS development program. For the studied concepts, the overall shape and aerodynamic configuration, the propulsion system, the architecture and lay-out of the stages are described and different technical solutions of RLV concepts are compared.