European Flexible Heat Shields: Advanced TPS Design and Tests for Future In-Orbit Demonstration - 2

EFESTO-2 is an EU-funded project under Horizon Europe that aims to enhance European expertise in Inflatable Heat Shields (IHS). Building on the achievements of the previous EFESTO project (H2020 funds No 821801), EFESTO-2 focuses on advancing key IHS technologies to increase their Technology Readiness Level (TRL). The project pillars include analyzing the business case for IHS applications, exploring additional aspects of IHS, improving tools and models, and establishing a development roadmap for IHS systems. This paper outlines the project objectives and plan, highlighting ongoing and future activities for the next two years, positioning it within the European re-entry technology roadmap. Funding was provided by the European Union's Horizon Europe program (grant agreement No 1010811041).