In the next few years, there will be men on the Moon.
"We will live there, we will use it as an economic resource, it is the new frontier", pleaded the director general of the European Space Agency (ESA), Josef Aschbacher, last week during the 14th European Space Conference in Brussels.
The director general of the European Space Agency, the Austrian Josef Aschbacher, in Berlin on September 10, 2021 Paul Zinken AFP / Archives
"The big question is: do we as Europeans want to take part in it or watch others do it? Today we don't have a ship to go and explore this new frontier. Imagine Christopher Columbus without his ship", challenged the boss of the agency bringing together 22 European states.
In unison, French astronaut Thomas Pesquet calls for "really thinking about a slightly stronger ambition at European level" in terms of manned flights, and ArianeGroup proposes a "reusable second stage concept" of a rocket, capable of carrying astronauts.
It would be a way to "develop technologies, the way to prepare the Moon, to prepare Mars", abounds Philippe Baptiste, the president of Cnes, the French space agency.
But, he stresses, "it's an eminently political question: what is Europe's ambition for space?"
These pleas come ahead of a European space summit in Toulouse on February 16 and an ESA ministerial conference in November which is to decide on the agency's priorities and budgets for the coming years.
For their part, the Indians intend to carry out the first test flight of their Gaganyaan manned flight program this year, China will send a taikonaut to the Moon by 2030 and the Americans will set foot there from 2025 with their Artemis program.
Each time, in sight, a permanent presence on and around the Moon, a starting point for more distant explorations.
Exploration projects also drain private investment.
They now represent 10 to 15% of the amounts invested by the private sector in space, a market which has itself increased tenfold in ten years, according to the firm McKinsey.
Question of means
About thirty Europeans have already stayed in space on board Russian or American missions in return for a European contribution.
Europe is already assured of three stays aboard the future lunar orbital station proposed by the Americans, called Gateway, for which it is building several modules.
Each time "we barter", summarizes Didier Schmitt, head of ESA strategy for exploration.
To obtain from NASA that a European also treads the lunar ground, the ESA intends in return to propose in November to the Member States to develop a "lunar lander" intended for refueling, he explained to the web TV Bsmart.
NASA, however, now depends on SpaceX, a private player, for its manned flights.
Astronauts do not have "access to all the information" and are considered "as passengers", judges German astronaut Alexander Gerst, for whom "it is a step backwards" and a threat to the future.
"We will be dependent on the services provided by others and we may not be able to meet our priorities," he warns.
For Europeans, it is time for a new reflection 30 years after the failure of the Hermès shuttle project, believes Jean-Jacques Tortora, director of the European Space Policy Institute (ESPI), a think tank based in Vienna. .
The arguments in favor of a European program "escape economic rationality", he agrees, "they are essentially political objectives, if Europe wants to have the status of a space power or not".
And "it is difficult to conceive that people, even as fortunate as Elon Musk (founder of SpaceX) or Jeff Bezos (Amazon), are able to do on an individual level what Europe as a whole decrees not to do. be able to afford".
The ESA budget devoted to exploration in 2021 amounted to 735 million euros, or 7% of that of NASA.
During the space conference in Brussels, none of the French, German and Italian ministers and representatives, whose countries represent 60% of the ESA budget, mentioned a European manned flight program among their priorities.
Not enough to dismantle Josef Aschbacher, who "does not ask for a decision today or in three weeks".
© 2022 AFP