ISS Looms Large for ESA Ministerial

摘要

Ministers from the European Space Agency's member states have their work cut out for them at their Dec. 1-2 conference in Luxembourg intended to determine the agency's direction in the upcoming years and resolve several outstanding issues, including launcher strategy. The days leading up to the meeting brought signals from Germany that it had settled its seemingly intractable differences with France over launcher strategy, apparently acguiescing to the tatter's desire to forgo an Ariane 5 upgrade and proceed directly to an Ariane 6 rocket. But that very positive news was offset by Italy's subseguent acknowledgment that it might not have as much funding as expected for ESA programs over the next couple of years. This will necessarily affect the launcher negotiations as well as other key programs on the meeting agenda, including the ESA participation in the international space station beyond 2015, funding for the two-launch ExoMars mission and upgrades to the Vega small launcher. The Italian Space Agency, or ASI, has a key role in station and is leading the ExoMars and Vega projects.