And this is where it begins on the question of the cost of launches

A rocket Ariane 6 here in 2020 or 2025. This is what calls for a report submitted recently to the French Prime Minister by CEA, DGA and CNES for take over of Ariane 5 and Soyuz launchers to this horizon. It is therefore suggested by the France, country leader in launch vehicles, to its European partners. Given the time required to complete such a between fifteen and twenty years program, a decision of principle must be taken in 2011, at the next Council of Ministers of the space agency European. Its Director General, Jean-Jacques Dordain, will have the opportunity to give his point of view today, at a press conference.

If it is obviously too early to describe in detail the technological building blocks of the future rocket, the report already provides the main features. Ariane 6 should first be monocharge and scalable to launch commercial, and institutional satellites (including military) in the range of 3 to 6 tons. "It is the first time that a report on the future of Ariane part of the evolution of the needs of the market," welcomes Jean-Yves the Gall, CEO of Arianespace. With this report back to the fundamentals of space policy, instead of focusing only on the maintenance of skills. "In the clear: no question of leaving the ideas of engineers for feeding studies offices.

Second objective: build a launcher "very competitive in terms of launch costs, construction and operation. And this is where the shoe pinches, because the sector industrial European can win in competitiveness without calling into question of the geographical return principle, that the workload be distributed in proportion to the money invested by each country. "Unchanged distribution of work, it cannot do much", noted François Auque, CEO of EADS Astrium, the industrial contractor for Ariane, who believes have done the maximum in the workforce. The question of the cost of launches should yet be treated as business, the report recommends a break with the current situation.

European preference

With growing competition from China and the India particular, the launching of commercial satellites market will prove more difficult. The rapporteurs advocate therefore that, in future, Arianespace Launches in priority for institutional satellites and just what is telecommunications satellites to "satisfy the minimum rate" of fire for the reliability of the rocket (5 or 6 per year). But to do this, two conditions must be met, which augurs a lot of debates between European.

The first is that the Member States adopt the principle of European preference. That is, they undertake to place their military satellites or semi-public on Ariane. This is far from being the case today: Italians, for example, launched in April a military satellite from a Russian rocket. "Both industrial and as citizen, I support the European preference", reacts Reynald Seznec, CEO of Thales Alenia Space Franco-Italian satellite manufacturer. The second condition, of course, is that those countries have the impression of financially.

And this is where it begins on the question of the cost of launches. "The European preference is arguable that if it is exercised in the best conditions of costs for the Member States financing the launcher sector, which is clearly not the case of the unanimous view of stakeholders", find indeed the rapporteurs.