Sara Morales Serrano

European Space Agency | ESA

ESA since 2011 leads the application of life cycle assessment (LCA) into space missions, from various satellite applications to launch segments. ESA adopt a holistic approach which requires system thinking when applying LCA to space mission, which results in a multidisciplinary interaction typical from system engineering processes. The expertise an...

As space activities continue to expand, with increasing numbers of launches and payloads, it becomes crucial to evaluate the environmental consequences of these developments. In this perspective, this study investigates the ground-phase environmental footprint of future in-space liquid bipropellant systems, focusing on MON3/MMH, 98%-HTP/RP-1, 98%-H...

Within the European space sector, heightened interest in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has been stimulated by an increased motivation and urgency on quantifying environmental consequences of space activities. The associated growth in the application of this method places a greater emphasis on obtaining high levels of transparency, reliability and val...

Like any industry, space activities generate pressures on the environment and strives towards more sustainable activities. A consensus among the European industrial stakeholders and national agencies in the Space sector is emerging on the need to address eco-design through the prism of the environmental Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology. Whil...

This paper presents a study based on wind tunnel research on biplane configurations. The objective of this research is to establish an experimental basis for relationships between the main geometrical parameters that define a biplane configuration (stagger, decalage, gap, and sweep angle) and the aerodynamic characteristics (CL, CD). This experimen...

Within the European space sector, heightened interest in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has been stimulated by an increased motivation and urgency on quantifying environmental consequences of space activities. The associated growth in the application of this method places a greater emphasis on obtaining high levels of transparency, reliability and val...

Space debris mitigation has been identified as a vital step to reduce and possibly stop the space debris population rapid growth that has been taking place in the last years. To optimise and enhance current technologies and to unfold innovative solutions related to the End-Of-Life (EOL) of satellites, the ESA Clean Space Office undertook and suppor...

Space debris mitigation has been identified as a vital step to reduce and possibly stop the space debris population exponential growth that has been taking place in the last years. To optimise and enhance current technologies and to unfold innovative solutions related to the End-Of-Life (EOL) of satellites, the ESA Clean Space Office undertook and...

Like any industry, space activities generate pressures on the environment and strives towards more sustainable activities. A consensus among the European industrial stakeholders and national agencies in the Space sector is emerging on the need to address eco-design through the prism of the environmental Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology. Whil...

The space industry generates pressures on the environment and strives towards more sustainable activities. Several actors of or related to the European space industry, such as ArianeGroup or and the European Space Agency (ESA), have identified the life cycle assessment methodology (LCA) as the most appropriate methodology to measure and then suppor...

Like any industry, space activities generate pressures on the environment and strives towards more sustainable activities. A consensus among the European industrial stakeholders and national agencies in the Space sector is emerging on the need to address eco-design through the prism of the environmental Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology. Whil...

This work presents an experimental design for studying low-velocity collisions into granular surfaces in low-gravity. In the experiment apparatus, reduced-gravity is simulated by releasing a free-falling projectile into a surface container with a downward acceleration less than that of Earth's gravity. The acceleration of the surface is controlled...

This work presents an experimental design for studying low-velocity collisions into granular surfaces in low-gravity. In the experiment apparatus, reduced-gravity is simulated by releasing a free-falling projectile into a surface container with a downward acceleration less than that of Earth’s gravity. The acceleration of the surface is controlled...