Reaching for the skies

Reaching for the skies

Failures are the stepping stones to success, they say. It’s a saying ISRO seems to have taken to heart, given its brave statements on the aborted GSLV launch. To this, ISRO could add another one: better late than never. For, the ‘last second reprieve’ might well have given it a chance to do a rethink on the programme.

Eleven years have elapsed since the programme was first conceived. The question that begs attention is whether there’s any real value in today’s globalised market for reinventing a second-generation launcher with the middling capabilities of the Geo Stationary Launch Vehicle?

The twin objectives of the GSLV mission according to ISRO are ‘‘to launch communication satellites for India and to provide commercial satellite launch services’’. While the former suited the quest for self-reliance and local technological superiority, GSLV’s commercial utility is questioned by ISRO itself: Dr. K Kasturirangan, ISRO chairperson, acknowledged that the net saving on launching a satellite using GSLV compared to other commercial launchers like the French-made Ariane rocket could be as low as $ 4,000 per kg of load sent into space.

It’s not clear how ISRO hopes to translate this small cost differential into a long-term commercial advantage. Wouldn’t it be better to rely on commercial launchers like Arianespace or the even cheaper sea-based launch facilities being provided by Russia, which is utilising its inventory of inter-continental ballistic missiles for shooting satellites into outer space?

Space faring is clearly an expensive business, what with the GSLV programme costing Rs 1,400 crore incidentally, the cost over-run has been to the tune of almost 100 per cent since the programme was kicked off and each rocket expecting to cost around Rs 150 crore.

Also, at its peak, GSLV can place only a 2,000 kg satellite in the communications orbit. This capability seemed not-so-modest 11 years ago, but is out of sync in an age where commercial communications satellites are utilising state-of-the-art Ku Band and other Internet services being put above the Earth are all in the order of 4,000-4,500 kg each.

The GSLV in its present format will never be able to reach that capability. Kasturirangan acknowledges as much: ‘‘GSLV is competitive only with medium range payloads, but not with the heavier class of satellites.’’ It’s the heavier ones that are in vogue today.

The scenario in the global communications sector is undergoing an upheaval, with land-based optical fibre technology giving tough competition to the risky business of communicating through satellites placed 36,000 km above the Earth.Kasturirangan plays the self-reliance card: ‘‘It is the quest for developing indigenous capability and the philosophy of self-reliance that’s behind GSLV,’’ he says. However, the realities of cold commerce state otherwise. The GSLV programme was conceived during the Cold War, when pursuing an indigenous technology development programme made sense. But governments today leave the business of launching satellites to commercial companies: for instance, Brazil launches its satellites using Arianespace, a consortium of European-based companies. India’s INSAT too has been launched by Arianespace.