Roscosmos invited to participate in an open tender for the right to a state contract for performance of work under the Federal Space Program of Russia for 2006 — 2015 years. Thus, the Russian Space Agency was made an order for the preliminary design (EP), the right to perform that will determine the tender. This work is allocated 250 million rubles. and take two years to build this new EP mode of transport.
Lot put up for tender is known as’ reusable rocket and space system for the first stage "(MRCA-1). It is about developing a universal returned the first stage with the ability to use a variety of space ships. The stage will be delivered to the reference orbit (200 km.) 7 -60 tonnes of payload.
Roscosmos from December 12, 2011. December 16, defined the developer MRCA, which is created under the new Russian cosmodrome East. However, the construction of the spaceport has, in fact, has not begun, and reusable system itself is only a distant prospect.
December 12, 2011 in Roskosmos opened envelopes with applications for participation in the tender to build the first phase of MRCA (code: ROC "MRCA-1"). It is a question only of the development of conceptual design of the system.
The cost of work — 250 million rubles. before September 2013 (50 million rubles. before the end of this year and 100 million rubles., in 2012 and 2013).
The winner of the tender should be theoretically and experimentally justify the steps of creating the basic features and technical solutions needed to create MRCA-1 and its constituent parts.
Reusable system itself, according to the documentation for the contest, designed for launching spacecraft weighing 25-35 tons on the orbits of different heights and inclinations, including geostationary and geosynchronous transfer orbits and escape trajectories using boosters. Another task of the future system — launching manned spacecraft.
Booster, according to the plans of Roscosmos, should be a two-stage — with a reusable first stage and the second single (fully reusable launch vehicle is seen only in the long term). This will save up to 20-30% of the cost of launch services and will solve the problem of fields falling stages.
Missile system, established under the MRCA-1 should produce at least 20 starts each year. According to the tender documents, the system is being developed exclusively for the future spaceport East, and it will pass the test at Kapustin Yar and Plesetsk. About Baikonur no speech: Russia leases this space center in Kazakhstan until 2050
According to the Russian Federal Space Agency, took part in the tender three businesses:
* GRC Makeev (Miass)
* "TsSKB-Progress" (Samara)
* Khrunichev. Khrunichev (Moscow)
Thus, in the Makeev Rocket Center, a project for a missile "Russian woman" with a reusable first stage. The support so far is designed for a payload of 21.5 tonnes during injection into low Earth orbit, but the engineers are ready to increase the payload of up to 35 tons, using the second stage.
In "TsSKB Progress’ individual projects reusable vertical launch missile systems were not kept, but the company has long worked with SRC Makeev for space launch vehicles and can offer a groundwork for the project" Rus-M "Hide this fall to address the Russian Federal Space Agency.
In the Khrunichev Center for many years, a draft of reusable system with reusable returned to the starting blocks of the first stage. This project — "Baikal-Angara". Reusable booster first stage has been developed in cooperation with the NGO "Lightning" and can be used for easy "Angara", as well as for medium and heavy.
And now, 16 December 2011., It was reported that the committee set up to consider bids of participants in its meeting decided to give preference to the Khrunichev Space Center.
It is known that the center offered Makeev Roskosmos a lower price for the performance of the task, namely, for 235 million rubles., But after looking at other criteria for future works department has decided to choose hrunichevtsev.