How United Launch Alliance’s new rocket expands the commercial space race

It looks like the often-delayed United Launch Alliance Vulcan Centaur rocket is ready for launch. A lot is riding on the new rocket, not the least of which is ULA’s hopes of competing with SpaceX, the one rocket company that rules them all, and its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.

The Vulcan Centaur has been under development since 2014 and has suffered numerous delays. When operational, the rocket will replace the ULA’s Atlas V and Delta IV rockets. It has a number of technological innovations that the company hopes will make it attractive to customers such as NASA, the United States military and commercial entities. They include BE-4 rocket engines in the first stage, courtesy of Blue Origin. The BE-4 runs on liquid methane and liquid oxygen. The section of the first stage with the rocket engines will be reusable.

The Centaur second stage is as venerable as the Vulcan first stage is new. The Centaur has been in use since the 1960s.

Another feature of the Vulcan Centaur is its ability to use a variety of solid rocket boosters. It can use two, four, or even six depending on what kind of payload is being launched and where it is going.

The Vulcan Centaur already has some important customers lined up. The rocket is scheduled to launch the Astrobotic Peregrine lunar lander, the first moon landing that the United States has attempted since the end of the Apollo program, on Dec. 24. It is also scheduled to launch the Sierra Space Dream Chaser space plane in April. Once operational, the Dream Chaser will take cargo to and from the International Space Station. The United States Space Force will split 21 launches of its latest satellites between the Vulcan Centaur and the SpaceX Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch systems.

The question hanging over the Vulcan Centaur is, can it compete against the likes of the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy? Last year, a story in Reuters pegged the cost of a Vulcan Centaur launch as $110 million, as opposed to $62 million for a Falcon 9. The launch cost will doubtless be even higher for versions that include strap-on SRBs.

Vulcan Centaur is not the only launch vehicle ready for its debut. The Blue Origin New Glenn and the Rocket Lab Neutron are slated to launch sometime in 2024. Both rockets have reusable first stages, similar to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy. The reusability feature will make both rockets highly competitive. That may not be the case for the Vulcan Centaur in the long run.

Vulcan Centaur has two things going for it.

First, government customers such as NASA and the Space Force are eager to have more than a single option for launch services. SpaceX has performed magnificently, lowering the cost of space launches by orders of magnitude. But decision makers in Washington are queasy about enabling a monopoly, no matter how cheap and reliable the service is. That queasiness is likely one reason the Space Force divided the launch contract between SpaceX and the ULA.

Second, the number of launch customers is expected to increase as time goes by. The Vulcan Centaur may launch the Boeing Starliner when it finally becomes ready for flight and the Atlas V is retired. The Dream Chaser, especially if a crewed version is developed, will be another possibility. The launches of cargo and crewed spacecraft will likely increase when private space stations become available as destinations and space tourism expand.

Even so, the engineers at ULA would be advised to constantly improve the Vulcan Centaur. An effort to make the Vulcan first stage entirely reusable would certainly be a considerable improvement.

Which launch vehicles will still be operational five years from now is a question that no one can accurately predict. No one, when SpaceX was first founded, would have predicted the absolute dominance that the company enjoys over the launch market.

The wildcard waiting to be played is on a launch pad at the SpaceX Starbase complex at Boca Chica, Texas. The Starship rocket, once it becomes operational, has the potential to make every launch vehicle that came before it obsolete. Its launch cadence and ability to throw huge amounts of payload into space are things never before seen outside of science fiction, The ULA and every other aerospace company should consider ways to deal with that history-changing development when it comes.

Mark R. Whittington, who writes frequently about space policy, has published a political study of space exploration entitled “Why is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon?” as well as “The Moon, Mars and Beyond,” and, most recently, “Why is America Going Back to the Moon?” He blogs at Curmudgeons Corner. He is published in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, The Hill, USA Today, the LA Times, and the Washington Post, among other venues.