Poland in orbit: five EU-funded space research projects in the spotlight

During the first half of 2025, Poland is holding the rotating presidency of the Council of the European Union for the second time. As president, Poland is steering work across all levels of the Council’s operations, aiming to foster collaboration and consensus among EU Member States.

With the official motto “Security, Europe!”, the Polish presidency focuses on strengthening European security in seven security dimensions. In the area of space the presidency will focus on a number of topics, including the use of Earth observation (EO) data and AI for security and crisis management. It will also promote synergies of space technologies with other industries, including defence. Under the auspices of the Polish Presidency, the EU Space Days 2025 will be organised in Gdańsk (27-28 May). 

Horizon Europe, the EU framework programme for research & innovation, is funding EU Space Research projects across various domains. These projects aim to develop cutting-edge space technologies, products and services, ensuring that the EU remains competitive in space and retains a high level of autonomy in accessing and utilising space.

With Poland’s EU presidency now in full swing, we highlight five EU-funded research projects with significant contributions from Polish participants:

EROSS SC – Revolutionising In-Space Operations and Services

PL beneficiary: PIAP Space

EROSS SC is enabling the maturation of robotic technologies needed for on-orbit servicing, a key element of In-Space Operations and Services. The ambitious project is integrating the different technologies into a single mission concept, covering various operations on orbiting satellites, including rendezvous, capturing and servicing. 

LUWEX – Extracting water from Moon dust 

PL beneficiaries: Scanway and Wrocław University of Science and Technology

LUWEX aimed to develop novel technologies for extracting and purifying water from lunar regolith. The international team of researchers successfully demonstrated the extraction technologies in laboratory conditions, showing how ice could be extracted from simulated lunar regolith. The purified water holds significant potential for use as drinking water, oxygen production, or rocket propellant in space – a critical step in supporting sustainable space exploration missions. The project ended on 31 December 2024; this video showcases its achievements.

ORCHIDE – Boosting on-board Earth observation applications

PL beneficiary: KP Labs

ORCHIDE focuses on optimising on-board data processing for Earth observation missions, addressing the challenge of handling large volumes of data generated by multiple instruments. The ability to process data on board allows for a more efficient use of available resources, thereby enhancing mission flexibility and reducing operational costs. The project seeks to facilitate the deployment and orchestration of image processing applications on board EO satellites, regardless of the hardware processing resources and the hosting software execution platform. 

SALTO – Towards a European reusable launcher 

PL beneficiary: SpaceForest

SALTO aims to raise the maturity level of the first European reusable rocket technology and significantly reduce launch costs, while ensuring improvements in the environmental footprint and strengthening Europe’s competitiveness in strategic space missions. Complementary to and in coordination with the ESA European THEMIS demonstrator programme, SALTO will perform in the course of 2025, for the first time in Europe, fly/recover/re-fly cycles of a reusable rocket first-stage demonstrator.

THEIA – Enhancing the Copernicus Security Service

PL beneficiary: Creotech Instruments

THEIA addresses the critical crisis management challenges posed by forced population displacements, which are caused by conflicts, climate change, extreme weather events and food shortage. The project is proposing the integration of Geospatial Artificial Intelligence (GeoAI) and Machine Learning with advanced data fusion and analysis techniques, combining space (Earth observation) and non-space data. The innovative crisis information tools created by the project will be tailored to user and policy needs, and will benefit a wide array of end-users including the Copernicus Security Services. 

Background

EU Space Research aims to foster a cost-effective, competitive, and innovative space industry and research community. Under Horizon Europe Cluster 4 – Space (Destination 5), HaDEA is funding projects that prepare future evolutions of the EU Space Programme components, foster the EU space sector’s competitiveness, reinforce its independent capacity to access space, and secure its autonomy of supply for critical technologies.