Editing Energia (rocket) (section)

== Development history ==
Work on the Energia/Buran system began in 1976 after the decision was made to cancel the unsuccessful [[N1 (rocket)|N1 rocket]]. The facilities and infrastructure built for the N1 were reused for Energia (notably the huge horizontal assembly building), just as NASA reused infrastructure designed for the [[Saturn V]] in the [[Space Shuttle program]]. Energia also replaced the "Vulkan" concept, which was a design based on the [[Proton (rocket family)|Proton]] and using the same [[hypergolic propellant]]s, but much larger and more powerful. The "Vulkan" designation was later given to a variation of the Energia which has eight boosters and multiple stages.

The Energia was designed to launch the Soviet "[[Buran (spacecraft)|Buran]]" reusable shuttle,<ref name= "Hendrickx" /> and for that reason was designed to carry its payload mounted on the side of the stack, rather than on the top, as is done with other launch vehicles. Design of the Energia-Buran system assumed that the booster could be used without the Buran orbiter, as a heavy-lift cargo launch vehicle; this configuration was originally given the name "Buran-T".<ref name= "JBIS-2002">B. Hendrickx, "The Origins and Evolution of the Energiya Rocket Family," ''J. British Interplanetary Soc., Vol. 55,'' pp. 242-278 (2002).</ref> This configuration required the addition of an upper stage to perform the final orbital insertion.<ref name= "JBIS-2002" /> The first launch of the Energia was in the configuration of a heavy launch vehicle, with the large [[Polyus (spacecraft)|Polyus]] military satellite as a payload, however Polyus failed to correctly perform the orbital insertion.

Due to the termination of the [[Buran programme|Buran program]] the Energia program was concluded after only two launches. The legacy of Energia/Buran project manifests itself in the [[RD-170]] family of rocket engines, and the [[Zenit (rocket family)|Zenit]] launcher, with the first stage roughly the same as one of the Energia first-stage boosters.