New research by Alessio Terzi and Francesco Nicoli explores the growing gap between US and European space launch capabilities, showing how lower US launch costs and a dominant share of global payloads are creating strategic dependencies and wider implications for Europe’s security and autonomy.
Abstract
Access to space is now a national security priority, yet its cost varies enormously across nations. Using a novel dataset of over 6,740 rocket launches (1960–2025), we estimate country-level launch costs and country-specific experience curves. In 2025, the average costs per kilogram to Low Earth Orbit ranged from $3,225 in the United States (US) to over $13,000 in India, with Europe, Russia, China, and Japan in between. Since 2010, only the US and Europe display statistically significant experience curves, with the US improving far faster. These widening asymmetries reinforce strategic dependencies with economic and security implications.
Read the paper published by the journal Economic Letters.
