What is the future of ISRO till 2025?

What is the future of ISRO?     

From the Mars Orbit Mission (Mangalyaan) to launching 20 satellites through a single rocket, ISRO has made great strides. 

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Its success has been unprecedented. 

ISRO has gained popularity in commercial space industry for 2 reasons : 

1. 100% successful foreign satellite launches using the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) 

2. Charging just 60% of the fees charged by foreign space agencies. Event companies like Google have chosen ISROto launch its satellites. 

Since May 1999, it has successfully launched 57 international customer satellites from 20 countries on board the PSLV. 

In this blog, we will look at 5 future missions of ISRO. Chandrayaan-1 was India's first lunar probe. It was launched by the ISRO in October 2008. 

Chandrayaan-2 will be India’s second mission to the Moon, carrying both an orbiter and lander-rover module. 

It is to be launched on India’s Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV-MkII) in 2018. 

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The mission is expected to improve our understanding of the origin and evolution of the Moon. 

It includes a lunar orbiter, lander and rover,all developed by India. The wheeled rover will move on the lunar surface and will pick up soil or rock samples for on-site chemical analysis. 

The data will be relayed to Earth through the Chandrayaan-2 orbiter. 

As the name suggests, Aditya that is Sun inSanskrit, will be launched to study sun. 

This will be the first Indian space mission to study the Sun. The Advisory Committee for Space Research conceptualized it in January 2008. 

It is being designed and will be built byISRO in collaboration with various Indian research organizations. 

It’s expected to be launched by ISRO around 2019-2020. 

It will also be the first Indian mission to be placed at Lagrangian point L1 which is far away from the Earth, from where continuous solar observations are possible. 

Only NASA and ESA have successfully placed satellites at the L1 point as of date. 

AVATAR (Aerobic Vehicle for Trans atmospheric Hypersonic Aerospace Transportation) is a manned single-stage reusable space plane capable of horizontal takeoff and landing. 

Its liquid air cycle engine would collect Air in the atmosphere on the way up, liquefy it, separate oxygen and store it on board for subsequent flight beyond the atmosphere. 

The full-fledged manned AVATAR flight is scheduled for 2025. This has immense commercial and military potential. 

The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation(SAARC) is a regional intergovernmental organization and geopolitical union in South Asia. 

Its member states include Afghanistan, Bangladesh,Bhutan, India, Nepal, the Maldives, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. SAARC satellite is Prime Minister NarendraModi’s brainchild. 

The SAARC Satellite is a communication-cum-meteorology satellite for the SAARC region. 

It was announced last year and its launch is likely in December 2016. The NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR)mission will be the biggest collaboration between the two space agencies yet. 

The mission involves building a 2,600 kg dual frequency synthetic aperture radar satellite that will“effectively make a time-lapse movie of the earth”. 

It will be used to keep a close eye on disturbances in the ecosystem, ice-sheet collapses and natural hazards.

It is notable for being the first dual band radar imaging satellite with both L and S-Band. 

Under the terms of the agreement, NASA will provide the mission's L-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR), a high-rate communication subsystem for science data, GPS receivers,a solid-state recorder, and a payload data subsystem. 

ISRO will provide the satellite bus, an S band synthetic aperture radar (SAR), the launch vehicle and associated launch services. 

Currently ISRO doesn’t use cryogenic engine in the the lower stage GSLV or GSLV Mk3 because

The current payloads that ISRO launches are almost entirely covered by these two rockets (along with PSLV). 

GSLV Mk3 can launch up to 4 ton to Geosynchronous/Geostationary orbit (and most GSO/GTO satellites are communication satellites and within this weight category) and up to 10 ton to Low Earth Orbit (the heaviest payload planned to be launched to LEO in near future is the crewed ‘Gaganyaan’ in 2022 which will weight around 8 ton). 

So most of the current requirements are fulfilled with the present capacity of GSLV rockets.

 Cryogenic engines are highly complex and costly. 

GSLV rockets are not reusable. So it would have been an expensive design if Cryogenic engine was included in the lower stage(s) in GSLV and GSLV Mk3 from the beginning.

ISRO always prefers cheap frugal engineering. Solid and conventional liquid stages are far cheaper options. 

So both GSLV rockets are designed to use conventional liquid and solid propellants in boosters and first/core stages.

1] 

L40= (Conventional) Liquid Strap-on boosters

S125/S139= Solid first-stage

GS2= (Conventional) Liquid second-stage (Vikas engine)

[Only 3rd stage is Cryogenic (CE-7 engine)]

2]

S200= Solid boosters

L110= (Conventional) Liquid core/first stage (Vikas engine)

[Only Upper stage is Cryogenic (CE-20 engine)]

The thrust increase is not the only way to increase payload capacity. What if satellite weight is reduced by various methods? This is also being done.

Satellites have their own propulsion system that fires to reach the designated orbit/correct the orbit. Conventionally this carries liquid fuel which significantly increases weight and also limits lifetime. 

Now a new electric propulsion system (EPS) is developed that can significantly reduce satellites’ weight and so a 4 ton class satellite will have capabilities like a 6 ton class satellite. 

GSAT-9 (launched in 2017) was the first Indian satellite to have this advanced system as a technology demonstrator. 

GSAT-20 to be launched this year will have full-fledged EPS for the first time. 

The heaviest satellite of ISRO till date, GSAT-11, has bandwidth of 16 GBPS but it was so heavy that it was launched by Ariane-5 rocket. 

GSAT-20 will have a bandwidth of a whopping 70 GBPS but can be launched by GSLV Mk3. 

I think EPS has a role for this weight reduction.

Also, technologies like composite material and other special materials can reduce satellites weight further.

• Future 

ISRO does have plans to increase payload capacity significantly and that by using higher-thrust engines in lower stages, as the OP suggested.

Although, it will not be a Cryogenic engine (where both Hydrogen and Oxygen are kept liquid at very low temperature). 

Rather it will be Semi-Cryogenic (Where Oxygen will be kept liquid and Kerosene will be the fuel instead of Hydrogen). 

A Semi-Cryogenic engine will have far higher thrust than a Cryogenic engine.

In fact, this will be a whole program to develop a new series of rockets based on GSLV Mk3 design. 

They will be modular where core semi-cryo stages will be kept the same and altering the boosters and upper Cryo stages, rockets of the same design but different capacity can be built in a short time. 

For this modular concept, they will be called MLV (Modular Launch Vehicle).

The semi-Cryogenic engine (SCE-200) is in development and the stage is likely to be ready in 2020.

The first use of this stage will be with GSLV Mk3 with L110 stage (Vikas engine stage) replaced by SC-160 stage (Semi-Cryogenic stage). 

ISRO is going to make this rocket immediately after the Semi-Cryogenic stage is ready. 

It will enhance Mk3’s payload capacity from 4 ton (current) to 6.5 ton (to GTO) or 10 ton (current) to probably around 15 ton (to LEO). 

This is likely to fly in 2021.

Then there will be a clustered Semi-Cryo stage (multiple Semi-cryo engines clustered together). 

The first rocket with this stage will be ready by 2023. It will not have boosters and capacity will be 5 ton to GTO or 10 ton LEO. 

Higher than current GSLV Mk3- even without any booster. This will be the first MLV (can be called MLV-1).

Heavy-lift and Super Heavy-lift Launch Vehicle (HLV and SHLV):

These are the class of vehicles having payload capacity of 20–50 ton (to LEO) and 50+ ton (to LEO).

ISRO is doing R&D for such rockets for the future.

MLV-2, 3, 4 with payload capacity of

10 ton to GTO (i.e. ~23 ton to LEO so Heavy-Lift Launch Vehicle or HLV),

11 ton to GTO (~25 ton to LEO so HLV)

and eventually 16 ton to GTO (41 ton to LEO so HLV) will be developed by addition of stages with cluster of engines and cluster of strap-on boosters built around the main structure.

Even more powerful vehicle is also planned (a Super Heavy-Lift Launch Vehicle or SHLV).

The concept is something like this (not official):

[LVM3 is another name of GSLV Mk3 and ULV is another name of MLV]

In around 2025, HLV and in around 2030, the SHLV of ISRO should be a reality.

This is an approximate timeline (according to ISRO VSSC director Dr. S. Somanath).