National Center for Space Studies

The National Center for Space Studies (CNES; French: Centre national d'études spatiales) is the space agency of the French government (administratively, a "public administration for industrial and commercial purposes"). Its headquarters are located in the center of Paris and it reports to the French Ministries of Defense and Research.

It operates from the Toulouse Space Center and the Kourou Space Center, but also has payloads launched from space centers operated by other countries. The president of CNES is Philippe Baptiste. CNES is a member of the Institute for Space, its Applications and Technologies. It is the largest and most important national organization of its kind in Europe.

History

CNES was created under the mandate of President Charles de Gaulle in 1961. It is the third oldest space agency in the world, after the Soviet space program (Russia) and NASA (United States). CNES was responsible for the training of French astronauts, until the last active CNES astronauts transferred to the European Space Agency in 2001.

Since January 2015, CNES is working with Germany and a few other governments to initiate a modest research effort with the hope of proposing a reusable LOX/methane launch vehicle by mid-2015. If built, testing of flight would likely not begin before about 2026. The design goal is to reduce both the cost and duration of reusable vehicle refurbishment, and is partly motivated by pressure from lower cost competitive options with newer technological capabilities that are not found in the Ariane 6.

Programs

CNES focuses on five areas:

• Access to space
• Civil applications of space
• Sustainable development
• Scientific and technological research
• Security and defence
• Access to space

France was the third space power (see Diamant) to gain access to space after the USSR and the United States, sharing technologies with Europe to develop the Ariane family of launchers. Commercial competition in space is fierce, so launch services must be tailored to the needs of space operators. The latest versions of the Ariane 5 launch vehicle can launch large satellites into geosynchronous orbit or perform dual launches - launching two full-size satellites with a single rocket - while the other launch vehicles used for European payloads and commercial satellites - the European/Italian Vega and the Russian Soyuz 2 - are small and medium-sized launchers, respectively.

Sustainable development

CNES and its partners in Europe - through the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) initiative - and around the world have launched satellites dedicated to observing land, oceans and atmosphere, as well as risk and crisis management. The best known are the SPOT satellites with the Vegetation instrument, the Topex/Poseidon, Jason-1 and Jason-2 oceanographic satellites, the Argos system, Envisat and the Pleiades satellites.

Civil Applications

CNES participates in the Galileo navigation program, together with the European Union and the European Space Agency (ESA), and, in a broader international context, in the Cospas-Sarsat search and rescue system.

Security and defense

The aforementioned Galileo navigation program, although intended primarily for civilian navigation, also has a military purpose, as do similar US Global Positioning System and Russian GLONASS satellite navigation systems.

In addition to SPOT and future Pléiades satellites, CNES works for the defense community as prime contractor for the Helios photo reconnaissance satellites.

Global Monitoring for Environment and Security - a joint initiative of the EU, ESA and national space agencies - pools space resources to monitor the environment and protect people, but also includes satellite support for the armed forces in border patrol, maritime security and peacekeeping missions.

Missions in progress

France's contribution to the International Space Station is giving French scientists the opportunity to perform original experiments in microgravity. CNES is also studying formation flying, a technique by which multiple satellites fly components of a much heavier and more complex instrument in a close, tightly controlled configuration, with satellites that are as close as tens of meters apart. Formation flight is being studied by CNES under the PRISMA project, led by Sweden, and on its own with the Simbol-x X-ray telescope mission.

CNES is currently collaborating with other space agencies on various projects, including the INTErnational Gamma-Ray Astrophysics Laboratory, XMM-Newton, and COROT orbital telescopes, and space probes such as Mars Express, Venus Express, Cassini-Huygens, and Rosetta. CNES has collaborated with NASA on missions such as the PARASOL Earth observation satellite and the CALIPSO meteorological and environmental satellite.

He has also collaborated with the Indian Space Agency (ISRO) on the Megha-Tropiques mission, which studies the water cycle and its impact on climate change. CNES plays an important role in ESA's Living Planet Program of Earth observation satellites, having built the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity satellite.