New Perspectives for Rocket Launching in Brazil: The Rise of Alcantara

Abstract

Copyright © 2023 by the International Astronautical Federation (IAF). All rights reserved.Currently Brazil has two rocket launch centers, they are the Hell Barrier Launch Center (CLBI), in the state of Rio Grande do Norte and the Alcântara Launch Center (CLA), in the state of Maranhão. The Alcântara Launch Center is the great Brazilian bet in terms of launches, because it has advantages in several areas: geographical aspect, CLA is located in a region close to the equator, less propellant is spent for positioning in geostationary orbit, there is no change in orbit after launch and there is a gain in momentum; geological aspect, there are no instabilities near the launch center, such as volcanoes; climatic aspect, since there are only occasional rains and no other varieties; aeronautical advantage: it is far from the major centers, so there is no significant air traffic volume of traffic on site, which allows a considerable amount of launches without putting air traffic at risk; demographic advantage: because it is a sparsely populated region, local releases do not put the population at risk. This paper objects to present the advantages of rocket launches in Brazilian launch centers and its potential to be a prominent commercial launch site, demonstrating how Brazil has reformulated its internal policy in search of entering the world aerospace market with the opening of Alcântara Space Center (CEA) to host propels by private companies, national or foreign. In the future, CEA can thus become one of the best locations in the world for commercial exploration or strategic rocket launches, heighten Brazil in the space field to a place compatible with its size.

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