Europe’s future space transport ecosystem

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ESA’s future launcher preparatory programme is crafting a space transportation ecosystem, guiding the companies and engineers of today to develop and test the technologies required to meet future needs. Space transportation will be moving towards frequent reusable launchers supporting a complete industrial ecosystem around Earth. In the coming decades, the European Space Agency (ESA) foresees transportation hubs in orbit around our planet providing logistic services much like airports or train stations on Earth. These hubs will offer refilling and maintenance services for spacecraft and provide platforms for manufacturing and assembly and in space transportation to other destinations. To create this new transportation ecosystem, new technology developments are needed, such as automatic rendezvous and capturing of spacecraft, transfer of fuel and payloads between spacecraft, tugging spacecraft to other orbits around Earth or destinations in space. The end goal for companies working on a proof of concept is to fly a demonstrator mission in space. Together with ESA, industry will get to this point through a process that starts with discussing needs and proposing solutions, and is followed by proving their use-case and collaborating on standards and regulations.  Developing and demonstrating these new technologies is also expected to open commercial opportunities for European space transportation companies. Finally, the Odyssey project proposes to put all these key techn

Published 2025-09-22 · Watch on YouTube ↗
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