CNES' director of launchers talks reusables rockets

[gosnold]

Last week France's top launch vehicle official, and one of the key players in Europe's launch policy, gave a conference on Europe’s response to US reusable launchers and its plans for the future.
I attended the conference, so I wrote up a translation of his remarks on my blog:
https://satelliteobservation.net/2018/06/02/cnes-director-of-launchers-talks-reusable-rockets/

There is also the pictures of his slides. I figured this intervention is important so it deserved its own topic, I hope it will not become as tense as the one on Charmeau's interview.

Personally after the talk I think CNES has the right attitude towards reuse and future developments and is doing what it can with its limited budget.

[TrevorMonty]

Excellent work.

I think CNES has right approach. Small low cost demostrators is great place to start. Its not just perfecting the landing but also learning how to build LV that can handle flight envelope and not need major overhaul to fly again.

[envy887]

Excellent work.

I think CNES has right approach. Small low cost demostrators is great place to start. Its not just perfecting the landing but also learning how to build LV that can handle flight envelope and not need major overhaul to fly again.

It is the right approach, but

What can Europe’s strategy for reuse be? First, we would not do only reusable launches. Geostationary and escape missions would be expendable. For low Earth orbit mission, we would use a return to launch site trajectory. That would enable us to do a few reuses per stage, and keep the manufacturing rate not too low while saving 30% on costs. So partial, reasonable reuse is accessible.

Reusing part of the LV part of the time, while a step in the right direction, has a high chance of not being competitive in 2030 when multiple providers are likely to have operational fully reusable vehicles.

Promethus is great, but it's what SpaceX did 15 years ago. If they want to get ahead in the commercial market by 2030 they need a high pressure staged combustion methalox engine in dev right now. It can come online and replace Promethus in 6-8 years, but they need to start now.

[Archibald]

it's what SpaceX did 15 years ago

SpaceX didn't even existed in 2003, or barely. 2009 might be a more correct date.

[Archibald]

Last week France's top launch vehicle official, and one of the key players in Europe's launch policy, gave a conference on Europe’s response to US reusable launchers and its plans for the future.
I attended the conference, so I wrote up a translation of his remarks on my blog:
https://satelliteobservation.net/2018/06/02/cnes-director-of-launchers-talks-reusable-rockets/

There is also the pictures of his slides. I figured this intervention is important so it deserved its own topic, I hope it will not become as tense as the one on Charmeau's interview.

Personally after the talk I think CNES has the right attitude towards reuse and future developments and is doing what it can with its limited budget.

Excellent job and a very nice reading, gosnold.
Sounds like a very honest-to-god assessmement of the present situation. He is not in denial, aknowledge SpaceX breakthrough and Ariane 6 weaknesses.

this

Q: What do you think will be the impact of megaconstellations like Oneweb?

A: I have no crystal ball.

But I am seeing that because all the satellite operator have adopted a kind of wait & see approach to the introduction of megaconstellations, they have put some satellite orders on hold and the commercial market is decreasing. It’s 17 satellites per year currently, while it used to be 30 per year some time ago.

The constellations will have to face the competition of GEO satellites and of ground networks, so it is possible they will fail like in the 1990s. Then the market would certainly not be multiplied by 10.

More or less what I said in the other thread.

Reusing part of the LV part of the time, while a step in the right direction, has a high chance of not being competitive in 2030 when multiple providers are likely to have operational fully reusable vehicles.

How about this scenario: BFR is way too big for the commercial market, it is above all a Mars colonial ship; Falcon 9 remain in service and partially reusable. The fact that BFR stage 2 is reusable doesn't mean it can scale down for F9R.

[RedLineTrain]

I don't think the approach reflected in the talk is competitive.  They are still "skating to where the puck is" and failing to appreciate ideas that have not already been demonstrated.

Meanwhile, Musk is leaving no stone unturned -- e.g., the balloon concept for upper stage reusability on Falcon 9.

[FutureSpaceTourist]

BFR is way too big for the commercial market

As long as it’s big enough to launch their payloads, surely the market cares about cost and reliability not size? If, and it may be a big if, SpaceX can achieve many reuses per vehicle then why wouldn’t BFR take a significant slice of the market?

In such a scenario I don’t see how Europe can capture much of the commercial market with their current planned vehicles.

[e of pi]

Thank you for sharing and translating this, gosnold, it makes for some interesting reading.

[speedevil]

How about this scenario: BFR is way too big for the commercial market, it is above all a Mars colonial ship; Falcon 9 remain in service and partially reusable. The fact that BFR stage 2 is reusable doesn't mean it can scale down for F9R.

If you were to sit down and think hard about how to forstall all possible thought by 'serious decisionmakers' (those invested in the current model) on actually facing reuse, announcing that your reuse is focussed on a 150 ton vehicle designed for Mars that can incidentally launch satellites for $5M would be nearly perfect.

[EnigmaSCADA]

I love that there's actually an ember (in some cases a fire) under the ass of people these days. Whether SpaceX succeeds or fails, I don't know, but I thank and give them credit for getting things back on track! Who wouldn't look at the ground in shame explaining to someone from the 1960's what we've been doing for the last 50 years?

[noogie]

Personally after the talk I think CNES has the right attitude towards reuse and future developments and is doing what it can with its limited budget.

I think it's a sober look at what they see as the challenges ahead.
The statements towards reuse sound more encouraging than what we've heard from other people in the European Space program.
However I think that for Europe to stay in the game, the whole top management of the European Space establishment need to embrace reuse, otherwise I can see the whole Prometheus, Callisto and Ariane Next being quietly taken out the back and killed off through lack of funding at a later date.

There are some bits that I think are worth expanding upon

In the USA, we should not oppose public and private space efforts: SpaceX is very much a creation of NASA thanks to technical and financial aid.

We've heard that repeatedly from members of the European space establishment.
Is this a case of "if you have a hammer, every problem looks like a nail"? That because SpaceX benefitted so much from COTs, that they are a creature of NASA?
How does SLS and ULA fit into that belief system?

The other thing is how narrowly focused they seem to be on tho GTO market

Regarding the global launch market, it represents around satellites per year, but only around 25 are open to global commercial competition. Most of the commercial launches are for geostationary communication satellites, but we do not know if the market will stay that way.

Q: What do you think will be the impact of megaconstellations like Oneweb?

A: I have no crystal ball. But I am seeing that because all the satellite operator have adopted a kind of wait & see approach to the introduction of megaconstellations, they have put some satellite orders on hold and the commercial market is decreasing. It’s 17 satellites per year currently, while it used to be 30 per year some time ago. The constellations will have to face the competition of GEO satellites and of ground networks, so it is possible they will fail like in the 1990s. Then the market would certainly not be multiplied by 10.

It seems as if LEO is way down on their priorities when considering their launch system. I understand that caution is warranted for the megaconstellations but there are already substantial LEO projects like Iridium that are happening (with a European prime contractor for the satellites no less!).
However the Earth observation market is not insignificant and along with the Oneweb Eurosoyuz order (one of the largest) must surely make this beyond the sideshow and maybe boxes that they seem to have put it in.

[Archibald]

Ariane 1 to 4 were entirely and completely designed for one single goal: GTO / GEO commercial satellites. They never got any cheaper third stage storable or solid fuel.

When launching SPOT-1 in polar orbit they used the over-powered HM-7, left it there, and then it exploded and one of the debris shot down Cerise, a french satellite.

[ZachF]

How about this scenario: BFR is way too big for the commercial market, it is above all a Mars colonial ship; Falcon 9 remain in service and partially reusable. The fact that BFR stage 2 is reusable doesn't mean it can scale down for F9R.

If you have to deliver a pizza, a Honda Civic might seem to make more sense than an 18 wheeler.

...Unless the Civic explodes into flames every time it delivers a pizza, now you're talking about a $15,000 pizza delivery. And this is precisely the reason why we have gone nowhere in the last 4+ decades.

Fuel is cheap (<$1/kg), Aerospace equipment is not (~$1,000/kg). BFR reduces the consumption of expensive aerospace equipment in exchange for more cheap $0.20/kg methalox fuel.

Cheaper is cheaper... does it really matter if it's only using 10% of it's capacity? Someday a small fully re-usable launcher could launch small payloads for less than a large re-usable LV... but if you're the only re-usable player in town the cost savings delta is so potentially huge you can undercut expendables even at tiny fractions of your launch capacity.

SpaceX didn't even existed in 2003, or barely. 2009 might be a more correct date.

I have to imagine he means "15 years ago" from the potential ~2028 flight of this partially re-usable LV.

[Oli]

Promethus is great, but it's what SpaceX did 15 years ago. If they want to get ahead in the commercial market by 2030 they need a high pressure staged combustion methalox engine in dev right now. It can come online and replace Promethus in 6-8 years, but they need to start now.

Not at all convinced that those super fancy and complex engines are the way to go.

[Nibb31]

If they want reusability, then Arianespace needs new engines.

[TrevorMonty]

Which is what Promethus is. It's good enough for an initial RLV with low build price of €1M.

[Archibald]

How about this scenario: BFR is way too big for the commercial market, it is above all a Mars colonial ship; Falcon 9 remain in service and partially reusable. The fact that BFR stage 2 is reusable doesn't mean it can scale down for F9R.

If you have to deliver a pizza, a Honda Civic might seem to make more sense than an 18 wheeler.

...Unless the Civic explodes into flames every time it delivers a pizza, now you're talking about a $15,000 pizza delivery. And this is precisely the reason why we have gone nowhere in the last 4+ decades.

Fuel is cheap (<$1/kg), Aerospace equipment is not (~$1,000/kg). BFR reduces the consumption of expensive aerospace equipment in exchange for more cheap $0.20/kg methalox fuel.

Cheaper is cheaper... does it really matter if it's only using 10% of it's capacity? Someday a small fully re-usable launcher could launch small payloads for less than a large re-usable LV... but if you're the only re-usable player in town the cost savings delta is so potentially huge you can undercut expendables even at tiny fractions of your launch capacity.

SpaceX didn't even existed in 2003, or barely. 2009 might be a more correct date.

I have to imagine he means "15 years ago" from the potential ~2028 flight of this partially re-usable LV.

Either for LEO big constellations, or the GEO comsat market, BFR is completely oversized. I do know about multiple satellites launch to LEO, GTO or GEO, but this thing is so big, does the number of satellites per launch vis a vis the market really works ?

By the way, can BFR deliver a payload to GTO / GEO without a refueling ? If a refueling is necessary, how much time / risk does it entails for the satellite owner ? Just asking, just being curious.

[kraisee]

By the way, can BFR deliver a payload to GTO / GEO without a refueling ? If a refueling is necessary, how much time / risk does it entails for the satellite owner ? Just asking, just being curious.

OT question, but according to Musk's IAC presentation in 2017, BFR should be capable of delivering around 25,000 kg to standard GTO-1500 insertion without refueling.

Zero performance directly to GEO for single launch.

Ross.

[ZachF]

It's oversized, but if it costs less *per launch* than anything but a smallsat launcher (which it should) who cares.

BFR can put 20+ tonnes to GTO with no refuelling. With one refill it can put over 100 tonnes to GTO.

Not consuming tonnes of $1000/kg aerospace equipment every flight changes the economics of launch completely.

[ZachF]

Which is what Promethus is. It's good enough for an initial RLV with low build price of €1M.

A seven-engined Prometheus/Ariane 7  is a solid concept that Arianespace should have ditched Ariane 6 for yesterday. It would place them solidly on the path they need to go. Ariane 6 is a waste of time.