Comment by postingawayonhn
11 hours ago
Yes, they've had a space agency, but the only launchers are expensive legacy vehicles.
This launch is a move towards lower cost and more frequent launches, that in the US are provided by SpaceX.
11 hours ago
Yes, they've had a space agency, but the only launchers are expensive legacy vehicles.
This launch is a move towards lower cost and more frequent launches, that in the US are provided by SpaceX.
It's not even the US in general, it's SpaceX specifically. Only the US and China have demonstrated reusable rockets, and only SpaceX demonstrated the actual reuse, the cadence and the economy of scale that it brings.
It means the laws of physics allow it, and anyone willing to invest the time and fiat to accomplish it can. This means the world will no longer need to rely on SpaceX for inexpensive lift to orbit through reusable first stages, which is objectively good. No different then China working towards obviating the need for ASML for EUV semiconductor manufacturing.
There are a lot more barriers to things in the real world. China has been dedicating immense effort and brainpower to cloning SpaceX, and they're still not especially close. I think a lot of us (certainly including myself) have no intuition for why this is, because we live in the software world where if you see something that is done then cloning it is generally just a matter of time and effort. But there's certainly some 'secret sauce' at SpaceX that does not seem easy to replicate.
That said I think this is awesome and hope the EU is able to make further advances. I have a very positive view of Musk, but the more competitors there are in space, the more likely we able to accelerate advances and efficiency in that domain. And I think everybody wins in that scenario.
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Just because you invest in it doesn't mean you end up with hugely cheap and scalable launch.
Europe has already invested far more in rocket then SpaceX did and isn't close.
If your capital efficiency is far lower, it might not be inexpensive. If you can get the scale because you don't have payloads, its going to be more expensive.
There is a incredibly long road between 'rocket can land' and 'cheap and scalable launch'. A long road most people don't see because its not as flashy as landing.
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Ariane 5 was the cheapest option available for a long time, now they're a bit behind. But the ESA is now working on reusable rockets too, it seems, with their Themis program.