European Space Agency

The European Space Agency (ESA), established in 1974, is an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to the exploration of space, currently with 17 member states. Headquartered in Paris, ESA has a staff of about 1,900 with an annual budget of about €2.9 billion in 2007.

ESA's main spaceport is Guiana Space Centre in Kourou, French Guiana (French territory). It is close to the equator, hence commercially important orbits are easier to access. ESA became the market leader in commercial space launches in the 1990s. In recent years, ESA has also established itself as a major player in space exploration.

ESA science missions are based at ESTEC in Noordwijk, Netherlands, Earth Observation missions at ESRIN in Frascati, Italy, ESA Mission Control (ESOC) is in Darmstadt, Germany, and the European Astronauts Centre (EAC), that trains astronauts for future missions is situated in Cologne, Germany.

History

Foundation

After the Second World War, many European scientists had left Western Europe in order to work either in the US or the Soviet Union. Although the booming recovering process of the 1950s made it possible for Western European countries to invest into research and specifically into space related activities, Western European scientists realised solely national projects would not be able to compete with the two major superpowers. In 1958, only months after the Sputnik shock, Edoardo Amaldi and Pierre Auger, two prominent members of the Western European scientific community at that time, met to discuss the foundation of a common Western European space agency. The meeting was attended by scientific representatives from eight countries, including Harrie Massey (UK).

The Western European nations decided to have two different agencies, one concerned to develop a launch system ELDO (European Launch Development Organisation) and the precursor of the European Space Agency, and ESRO (European Space Research Organisation) that was established on March 20, 1964 per an agreement signed on June 14, 1962. From 1968 to 1972 ESRO celebrated its first successes. Seven research satellites were brought into orbit, all by US launch systems.

The ESRO's successor organisation ESTEC (European Space Research and Technology Centre, based in Noordwijk, the Netherlands) is still a part of ESA, though ESA itself is a much bigger organisation today. The ESA in its current form was founded in 1974, when ESRO was merged with ELDO. The ESA was constituted of 10 founding members: Belgium, Germany, Denmark, France, United Kingdom, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland and Spain.^[1] ESA launched its first major scientific mission in 1975, Cos-B, a space probe monitoring gamma-ray emissions in the universe.

End of space race

Beginning in the 1970s, when the space race between the US and the Soviet Union had tuned down and space budgets were cut dramatically in both superpowers, ESA established itself as a forerunner in space exploration. ESA joined NASA and the UK in the IUE, the world's first high-orbit telescope, which was launched in 1978 and operated very successfully for 18 years. A number of successful Earth-orbit projects followed, and in 1986 ESA began Giotto, its first deep-space mission, to study the Comets Halley and Grigg-Skejllerup. Hipparcos, a star-mapping mission, was launched in 1989 and in the 1990s SOHO, Ulysses and the Hubble Space Telescope were all jointly carried out with NASA. Recent scientific missions in cooperation with NASA include the Cassini-Huygens space probe, to which ESA contributed by building the Titan landing module Huygens.

As the successor of the ELDO, ESA has also constructed rockets for unmanned scientific and commercial payloads. Ariane 1, launched in 1979, brought mostly-commercial payloads into orbit from 1984 onward. The next two developments of the Ariane rocket were intermediate stages in the development of a more advanced launch system, the Ariane 4, which operated between 1988 and 2003 and did establish ESA as the world leader in commercial space launches in the 1990s. Its successor, the Ariane 5 rocket, has established itself within the heavily competitive commercial space launch market after its first flight which ended in failure in 1997 and prospectively will reach 25 successful launches by 2006.

The beginning of the new millennium saw ESA become, along with agencies like NASA, JAXA, and Roscosmos, one of the major participants in scientific space research. While ESA had relied on cooperation with NASA in previous decades, especially the 1990s, changed circumstances (such as tough legal restrictions on information sharing by the United States military) led to decisions to rely more on itself and on cooperation with Russia. A recent press issue thus stated:

Russia is ESA's first partner in its efforts to ensure long-term access to space. There is a framework agreement between ESA and the government of the Russian Federation on cooperation and partnership in the exploration and use of outer space for peaceful purposes, and cooperation is already under way in two different areas of launcher activity that will bring benefits to both partners.^[2]

Most notable for its new self-confidence are ESA's own recent successful missions Smart-1, a probe testing cutting-edge new space propulsion technology, the Mars Express mission as well as the development of the Ariane 5 rocket.

ESA maintains its scientific and research projects mainly for astronomy-space missions such as Corot, launched on 27 December 2006, a milestone in the search for extrasolar planets.

Goals and aims

ESA has ambitious space plans that may be divided into three large categories. First, ESA will maintain its scientific and research projects (e.g. tests and developments of new propulsion systems), try to find ways to reduce costs for their rocket fleet while enhancing their capacities, honour its commitments regarding the ISS and engage in further space exploration like the Venus Express mission that was launched in late 2005. The second category has many parallels to NASA's plans and consists of astronomy-space missions such as the Planck Surveyor studying the cosmic microwave background (2008), the Herschel space observatory (2008), and the Darwin interferometer.

While the projects described above are more or less similar in their structure and aim as NASA's and other space agencies' plans, the ESA's Mars project is different. The Aurora Programme lays out a time table for future missions to Mars, however in contrast to NASA's plans there is no emphasis on manned or unmanned lunar missions, it rather includes several flagship missions designed to develop and test technology needed for a manned European Mars mission currently planned for 2030. Among these flagship missions is ExoMars, a mission involving a Mars rover. Until 2005 ExoMars was planned to be a joint mission between NASA and ESA, however obstacles such as American technology law that prohibits sharing of classified space technology information led to ESA deciding to go for it alone. The mission is currently planned to launch in 2013. An even more ambitious Mars project is the Mars Sample Return Mission, that is planned as a follow-up mission to ExoMars. It will involve the first time a probe will return of samples from another planet, making it necessary to construct an ascent module that is capable of starting into Mars orbit and dock with the original probe.

Among the actions for returning the investment to society, they have developed the SCOS 2000 satellite control centre, and they allow the use of it free of charge to any European firm.

To increase the human value of the participating countries, ESA also develops collaborative training programs for students, young graduates and Post Doctorals. Some countries have their own bilateral agreements with ESA like the Portuguese trainees or the Spanish Trainees programs. The return of the trainees to their respective country aims to stimulate their national space industry.

Member countries and structure

     ESA member states     ECS states

ESA comprises the national space organisations and other entities of seventeen countries that participate to various degrees in the mandatory (23% of total expenditures or €667 million in 2005) and optional space programs (72% of total expenditures or €2138 million in 2005):^[4][5]

According to the Resolution 8, Annex 1, of the Convention for the establishment of the European Space Agency.^[6] all meetings of the agency are held in English, French and German, with translation provided in these three languages. All official documents are available in English and French with all documents concerning the ESA-Council being available in German, too.

Enlargement

Many countries are likely to join ESA in the coming years, especially the countries who were part of the EU-enlargement in 2004 (on 12.6.2007 negotiation about the full membership of the Czech Republic started).^[7] In addition ESA entered into important partnership agreements with non-member countries:

• Hungary (5.11.2003),^[8] the Czech Republic (24.11.2003),^[9] Romania (17.2.2006)^[10] and Poland (27.4.2006)^[11] signed the agreement to become a European Cooperating State (ECS) which enables them to develop a five-year Plan for European Cooperating State (PECS), that is aimed at preparing the states for full membership. Their firms can bid for and receive contracts to work on programmes. The countries can participate in almost all programmes, except for the Basic Technology Research Programme. The membership fees are much lower than with full membership.
  • Estonia signed Cooperation Agreement with ESA on 26 June 2007 which is first step before signing ECS and full membership.^[12]
    • Slovenia showed an interest in joining, either as full member or European Cooperating State, and hosting of the Galileo Supervisory Authority
    • Since January 1, 1979, Canada has had the special status of a Cooperating State with the ESA. By virtue of this accord, Canadian Space Agency takes part in ESA's deliberative bodies and decision-making and also in ESA's programmes and activities. Canadian firms can bid for and receive contracts to work on programmes. The accord has a provision ensuring a fair industrial return to Canada.
    • ESA has entered into a major joint venture with Russia
    • Since China started to invest more money into space activities, the Chinese Space Agency has sought international partnerships. ESA is, beside the Russian Space Agency, one of its most important partners. Recently the two space agencies cooperated in the development of the Double Star Mission.

    Budget

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    Paris headquarters
    Image:Esoc kontrollraum.jpg

    The ESA control room in Darmstadt, Germany

    The budget of ESA was announced as €2.977 billion for 2005 (a ten percent increase on 2004) and for 2006 is estimated at €2.904 billion.^[13] A large part of ESA's budget is invested in ESA's launch vehicles that are currently the most expensive part of ESA's activities (Twenty-two percent of the budget goes into launch vehicles; human space flight is second in budget expenditures). In 2005, the three largest contributors, together funding two thirds of ESA's budget, are France (29.3%), Germany (22.7%) and Italy (14.2%).^[14]

    An important ministerial conference approved nearly all of ESA's budget requests in December 2005. The budget for the mandatory ESA programme, parts of the optional programme (i.e. optional for ESA's member states such as the ISS involvement) as well as important projects such as Aurora or the EU-backed Galileo navigation system have been approved. No decision has been reached with regard to ESA's involvement in the Russian Kliper project, a feasibility study worth €50 million was not approved.^[15] ESA's budget will stay at about the same, however inflation-adjusted, level as 2005 throughout the next 5 years.

    Member states	Mandatory Contr.	Optional Contr.	Total (€ mill.)	Total (%)
    France	15.63%	31.55%	778.8	27.97%
    Germany	23.41%	21.45%	614.8	22.08%
    Italy	12.88%	14.59%	397.9	14.29%
    United Kingdom	16.93%	5.91%	239.3	8.59%
    Belgium	2.83%	7.37%	167.4	6.34%
    Spain	6.87%	5.76%	169.0	6.07%
    Switzerland	3.40%	3.49%	97.3	3.49%
    Netherlands	4.43%	2.87%	90.9	3.26%
    Sweden	2.61%	2.11%	62.5	2.25%
    Austria	2.26%	0.87%	33.7	1.21%
    Norway	1.70%	1.02%	33.2	1.19%
    Denmark	1.82%	0.78%	28.8	1.03%
    Finland	1.37%	0.54%	20.7	0.74%
    Ireland	0.95%	0.30%	12.8	0.46%
    Portugal	1.40%	0.21%	12.7	0.45%
    Greece	1.50%	0.12%	12.5	0.43%
    Luxembourg	0.21%	0.13%	4.2	0.15%

    • Note that 5% of ESA's budget comes from third party sources. E.g. Canada.

    Locations

    • Headquarters of ESA, Paris, France
    • European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), Darmstadt, Germany
    • Centre Spatial Guyanais, Kourou, French Guiana
    • European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC), Noordwijk, The Netherlands
    • ESA Centre for Earth Observation (ESRIN), Frascati, Italy
    • European Astronaut Centre (EAC), Cologne, Germany
    • European Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC), Madrid, Spain [10].
    • ESTRACK European Space Tracking Network

    Launch vehicle fleet

    ESA has made great progress towards its goal of having a complete fleet of launch vehicles in service, competing in all sectors of the launch market. ESA's fleet will soon consist of three major rocket designs, Ariane 5, Soyuz and Vega. Rocket launches are carried out by Arianespace, a CNES subsidiary (a minority share is held by EADS as well), at CNES's spaceport in French Guiana. Because many communication satellites have equatorial orbits, launches from French Guiana are able to take larger payloads into space than from other northern spaceports. In addition equatorial launches give spacecrafts an extra 'push' of nearly 500 m/s due to the higher rotation velocity of someone standing on the equator than near the Earth's axis where rotation velocity approaches nil.

    Ariane 5

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    The launch of an Ariane 5

    The Ariane 5 rocket is the primary launcher of the ESA. Its maximum estimated payload is 6–10 metric tons to GTO and up to 21 metric tons to LEO. The launch craft has been in service since 1997 and replaced the Ariane 4. The Ariane rocket exists in several specifications, the heaviest one of these is the Ariane 5 ECA that failed during its first test flight in 2002, but has since made ten consecutive successful flights.^[16]

    ESA's Ariane 1, 2, 3 and 4 launchers (the latter of which was ESA's long time workhorse) have been retired.

    Soyuz launch vehicle

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    Soyuz is a Russian medium payload (ca. 3 metric tons to GTO) launcher to be brought into ESA service in 2007.^[17] ESA has entered into a €340 million joint venture with the Russian Federal Space Agency over the use of the Soyuz launcher.^[18] Under the agreement, the Russian agency will manufacture Soyuz rocket parts for ESA, which will then be shipped to French Guiana for assembly. ESA benefits because it gains a medium payloads launcher, complementing its fleet while saving on development costs. In addition, the Soyuz rocket—which has been the Russian's space launch workhorse for some 40 years—is proven technology with a good safety record, which ESA might be happy to use for launching humans into space. Russia also benefits in that it will get access to the Kourou launch site. Launching from Kourou rather than Baikonur will allow the Russians to almost double the Soyuz payload (3.0 tonnes vs. 1.7 tonnes), because of Kourou's closer proximity to the equator. Both agencies benefit from the long term strategic cooperation that in addition will be used to jointly develop future technology. It is perhaps worth noting that France (ESA's largest contributor) has historically had good relations with Russia, which contributed to reaching the agreement.^[19]

    Vega

    Vega is ESA's small payload (ca. 1.5 metric tons to 700 km orbit) launcher; its first launch is planned for 2008. The leading ESA's member state for the Vega Programme is Italy contributing 65% of the costs. Vega itself has been designed to be a body launcher with three solid propulsion stages and an additional liquid propulsion upper module to place the cargo into the exact orbit intended. For a small-cargo rocket it is remarkable that Vega will be able to place multiple payloads into orbit. Its first and main stage (P80) is a direct modification of Ariane 5 EAP (Solid boosters) developed by the CNES, the French space agency.

    See also:^[20]

    Human space flight

    History

    Image:S91-52649.jpg

    Ulf Merbold became the first ESA astronaut to fly into space.

    At the time ESA was formed, its main goals did not encompass human space flight, rather it considered itself to be primarily a scientific research organisation for unmanned space exploration in contrast to its American and Soviet counterparts. It is therefore not surprising that the first non-Soviet European in space was not an ESA astronaut on a European space craft: It was Czechoslovak Vladimir Remek who in 1978 became the first non-Soviet European in space (the first European in space being Yuri Gagarin of the Soviet Union) — on a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft, followed by the Pole Mirosław Hermaszewski and East German Sigmund Jähn in the same year. This Soviet cooperation programme, known as Intercosmos, primarily involved the participation of Eastern bloc countries, however in 1982, Jean-Loup Chrétien became the first western European on a flight to the Soviet Salyut 7 space station.

    Because Chrétien did not officially fly into space as an ESA astronaut, but rather as a member of the French CNES astronaut corps, the German Ulf Merbold is considered the first ESA astronaut to fly into space. He participated in the STS-9 Space Shuttle mission that included the first use of the European built Spacelab in 1983. STS-9 marked the beginning of an extensive ESA/NASA joint partnership that included dozens of space flights of ESA astronauts in the following years. Beside paying for seats on the Space Shuttle, ESA continued its human space flight cooperation with the Soviet Union and later Russia, including numerous visits to Mir.

    During the latter half of the 1980s, European human space flights changed from being the exception to routine and therefore, in 1990, the European Astronaut Centre in Cologne, Germany was established. It selects and trains prospective astronauts and is responsible for the coordination with international partners especially with regards to the International Space Station. As of 2006, the ESA astronaut corps officially includes 12 members, including nationals from all the large Western European countries except the United Kingdom.

    Astronaut Corps

    See also: European Astronaut Corps

    The astronauts of the European Space Agency are:^{[citation needed]}

    Jean-François Clervoy Frank De Winne² Pedro Duque² Reinhold Ewald Léopold Eyharts Umberto Guidoni¹² Christer Fuglesang² André Kuipers²

    Paolo Nespoli² Claude Nicollier Philippe Perrin¹² Thomas Reiter² Hans Schlegel Gerhard Thiele¹ Michel Tognini¹ Roberto Vittori²

    ¹ retired now^{[citation needed]}

    ² have visited the International Space Station

    Manned launch vehicles

    

    

    Artist's impression of the Hermes Shuttle

    In the 1980s France pressed for an independent European manned launch vehicle. Around 1978 it was decided to pursue a reusable spacecraft model and starting in November 1987 a project to create a mini-shuttle by the name of Hermes was introduced. The craft itself was modelled comparable to the first proposals of the Space Shuttle and consisted of a small reusable spaceship that would carry 3 to 5 astronauts and 3 to 4 metric tons of payload for scientific experiments. With a total maximum weight of 21 metric tons it would have been launched on the Ariane 5 rocket, which was being developed at that time. It was planned solely for use in Low-Earth orbit space flights. The planning and pre-development phase concluded in 1991; however, the production phase was never fully implemented because at that time the political landscape had changed significantly. With the fall of the Soviet Union ESA looked forward to cooperation with Russia to build a next-generation human space vehicle. Thus the Hermes program was cancelled in 1995 after about 3 billion dollars had been spent.

    In the 21st century ESA started new programs in order to create its own manned spacecraft, most notable among its various projects and proposals is Hopper, whose prototype by EADS, called Phoenix, has already been tested. While projects such as Hopper are neither concrete nor to be realised within the next decade, other possibilities for human spaceflight in cooperation with the Russian Space Agency have emerged. Following talks with the Russian Space Agency in 2004 and June 2005,^[21] a cooperation between ESA and the Russian Space Agency was announced to jointly work on the Russian-designed Kliper, a reusable spacecraft that would be available for space travel beyond mere LEO (e.g. the moon or even Mars). It was speculated that Europe would finance part of it. However a €50 million participation study for Kliper, which was expected to be approved in December 2005, was finally not approved by the ESA member states. The Russian state tender for the Kliper project was subsequently cancelled in the summer of 2006.

    In June 2006 ESA member states granted 15 million to the Crew Space Transportation System (CSTS) study, a two-year study to design a spacecraft capable of going beyond Low-Earth orbit based on the current Soyuz design. This project is pursued with Roskosmos instead of the previously cancelled Kliper proposal. A decision on the actual implementation and construction of the CSTS spacecraft is contemplated for 2008, with the major design decisions being made before the summer of 2007.

    Cooperation with other organisations

    European Union

    Please help improve this article or section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion. (March 2008)

    Image:GalileoPS.jpg

    The Galileo positioning system has been initiated by the European Union and ESA

    The ESA is not within the structures of the European Union (EU), and has non-EU countries such as Switzerland and Norway, two EFTA countries as members. There are however ties between those organisations, with various agreements in place and being worked on, to establish the legal status of ESA with regard to the EU.^[22] There are common goals between ESA and the EU, and ESA has an EU liaison office in Brussels.

    The EU's new Treaty of Lisbon, which is expected to come into force in 2009, makes space policy to an area for voting in the European Council. This might lead to a more united stance on space policy, and make new ties between the EU and ESA more relevant.

    National space organisations of member countries

    • The Centre National d'Études Spatiales (CNES) (National Centre for Space Study) is the French government space agency (administratively, a "public establishment of industrial and commercial character"). Its headquarters are in central Paris. CNES is the main participant on the Ariane project. Indeed CNES designed and tested all Ariane family rockets (mainly from its centre in Evry near Paris)
    • The British National Space Centre (BNSC) is a partnership of the UK government departments which are active in space. Through the BNSC the partners provide delegates to represent the UK on the various ESA governing bodies. Each partner funds its own programme.
    • The Italian Space Agency (Agenzia Spaziale Italiana or ASI) was founded in 1988 to promote, coordinate and conduct space activities in Italy. Operating under the Ministry of the Universities and of Scientific and Technological Research, the agency cooperates with numerous entities active in space technology and with the president of the Council of Ministers. Internationally, the ASI provides Italy's delegation to the Council of the European Space Agency and to its subordinate bodies.
    • The German Aerospace Center (DLR) (German: Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e. V.) is the national research centre for aviation and space flight of the Federal Republic of Germany and of other member states in the Helmholtz Association. Its extensive research and development projects are included in national and international cooperative programmes. In addition to its research projects, the centre is the assigned space agency of Germany bestowing headquarters of German space flight activities and its associates.
    • The Instituto Nacional de Técnica Aeroespacial (INTA) (Spanish:National Technical Institute for Aerospace) is the spacial agency for Spain.

    International Space Station

    Image:Columbus module delivered to KSC.jpg

    ISS module Columbus at Kennedy Space Center

    With regard to the ISS ESA is not representing all its member states: 5 of the 16 countries have opted out because of either concerns on the expenses of the project or lack of interest. ESA is taking part in the construction and operation of the ISS with contributions such as Columbus, a science laboratory module that was brought into orbit by NASA's STS-122 Space Shuttle mission and the Cupola observatory module that was completed in July 2005 by Alenia Spazio for ESA. The current estimates for the ISS are approaching €100 billion in total (development, construction and 10 years of maintaining the station) of which ESA has committed itself to pay €8 billion.^[23] About 90% of the costs of ESA's ISS share will be contributed by Germany (41%), France (28%) and Italy (20%). German ESA astronaut Thomas Reiter was the first long-term ISS crew member.

    As of 2007, the spacecrafts that establish the supply link to the ISS are the Progress and Soyuz spacecrafts as well as the Space Shuttle. The European Space Agency has developed the ATV for the ISS, the ATV, an Automated Transfer vehicle with a cargo capacity of 8 metric tons that will be serving the ISS beginning in January, 2008. With the Space Shuttle reaching its retirement age in 2010, until NASA has a replacement for it such as COTS (the CEV is not expected to make its first operational manned flight before 2012) the ATV together with Progress, Soyuz and the Japanese transporter HTV (which will be ready in 2009) will be the only links between Earth and the ISS.

    See also

    • List of projects of the European Space Agency

    v • d • e Topics on the European Space Agency
    Spaceports	Guiana Space Centre · Esrange	Image:Ariane-1.jpg
    Related	EUMETSAT · Orfeo Programme · European Space Camp · Arianespace
    Projects	Cancelled Eddington mission Past Cos-B · Double Star Mission · ERS-1 · Giotto mission · Hipparcos · Huygens probe · ISO · IUE · SMART 1 · YES2 Current Already launched Artemis · Corot · Cluster · Envisat · ERS-2 · ERS-1 · GIOVE-A · Galileo positioning system · Hubble Space Telescope · Integral · Mars Express · MetOp-A · Rosetta · SOHO · Ulysses · XMM-Newton · Venus Express To be launched ADM-Aeolus · BepiColombo · Chandrayaan-1 · CryoSat-2 · Don Quijote · ExoMars · Galileo positioning system · Gaia · GOCE · GIOVE-B · Herschel Space Observatory · KEO · James Webb Space Telescope · LISA Pathfinder · Planck Satellite · SMOS · Proba-2 Future Crew Space Transportation System · Aurora Programme · Cosmic Vision · XEUS · Darwin Mission · EADS Phoenix · FLPP · IXV · Mars Sample Return Mission · Aurora Programme · Solar Orbiter
    Spaceflight Portal · Technology Portal · Europe Portal

    References

    1. ^ ESA Portal - Press Releases - ESA turns 30! A successful track record for Europe in space
    2. ^ ESA website article on cooperation (especially with Russia). [1]
    3. ^ Interview with Jean-Jacques Dordain by Jaxa in 2005. [2]
    4. ^ http://www.esa.int/esapub/annuals/annual05/ESA_AR2005.pdf ESA annual budget for 2005
    5. ^ Following its ratification of the ESA Convention, Luxembourg has become ESA's 17th Member State with effect from 30 June 2005.
    6. ^ CONVENTION for the establishment of a European Space Agency, Annex 1 Resolution 8 page 116
    7. ^ AP: European Space Agency (ESA) Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain, center, arrives for a meeting with Czech Premier Mirek Topolanek in Prague, Tuesday
    8. ^ ESA: Hungary and the Czech Republic sign ECS agreements with ESA
    9. ^ ESA: Czech Republic becomes second ESA European Cooperating State
    10. ^ ESA: Romania becomes third ESA European Cooperating State
    11. ^ ESA: Poland becomes the fourth ESA European Cooperating State
    12. ^ ESA: Estonia signs Cooperation Agreement with ESA
    13. ^ ESA Portal - ESA and the EU
    14. ^ Figures regarding the ESA budget and the three biggest contributors to it. [3]
    15. ^ ESA Portal - ESA and the EU
    16. ^ Information on Ariane 5 provided by ESA. [4]
    17. ^ Article by ESA on the launch date of Soyuz from French Guiana. [5]
    18. ^ ESA information on the cooperation with Russia on the Soyuz spacecraft. [6].
    19. ^ EuroNews report about the joint venture
    20. ^ ESA's Vega BrochurePDF (122 KiB)
    21. ^ Article in the Guardian from May 22, 2005 [7]
    22. ^ ESA information on its relationship to the EU. [8]
    23. ^ ESA website on the International Space Station and its share of the cots. [9]

    
    

    Further reading

    • Bonnet, Roger; Manno, Vittorio (1994). International Cooperation in Space: The Example of the European Space Agency (Frontiers of Space). Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-45835-4.
    • Johnson, Nicholas (1993). Space technologies and space science activities of member states of the European Space Agency. OCLC 29768749 .
    • Peeters, Walter (2000). Space Marketing: A European Perspective (Space Technology Library). ISBN 0-7923-6744-8.
    • Zabusky, Stacia (1995 and 2001). Launching Europe: An Ethnography of European Cooperation in Space Science. ISBN B00005OBX2.
    • Harvey, Brian (2003). Europe's Space Programme: To Ariane and Beyond. ISBN 1-85233-722-2.

    External links

    

    Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

    European Space Agency
    • ESA Portal – official website
    • European Space Agency – Encarta entry
    • A European strategy for space – Europa
    • European Space Agency – The Space Fellowship news blog

    v • d • e Public sector space agencies

    Human launch capability Launch capability Operate satellites  People's Republic of China  Russian Federation  Soviet Union (defunct)  United States ESA European Space Agency  India  Israel  Japan  Ukraine  Argentina  Brazil  Canada  France Germany  Indonesia  Iran  Italy  Malaysia  Pakistan  South Korea  Spain  Republic of China  United Kingdom See also: Timeline of first orbital launches by country

    af:ESA

    bn:ইউরোপিয়ান স্পেস এজেন্সি zh-min-nan:Europa Thài-khong Chóng-sú bs:Evropska svemirska agencija bg:Европейска космическа агенция ca:Agència Espacial Europea cs:Evropská kosmická agentura da:ESA de:Europäische Weltraumorganisation et:Euroopa Kosmoseagentuur el:Ευρωπαϊκός Οργανισμός Διαστήματος es:Agencia Espacial Europea eo:Eŭropa Kosma Agentejo eu:Europar Agentzia Espaziala fr:Agence spatiale européenne gl:ESA hr:Europska svemirska agencija ia:Agentia Spatial Europee it:Agenzia Spaziale Europea he:סוכנות החלל האירופית ka:ევროპული კოსმოსური სააგენტო la:ESA lv:Eiropas kosmiskā aģentūra lb:European Space Agency lt:Europos kosmoso agentūra hu:Európai Űrügynökség mr:इसा nl:Europese Ruimtevaartorganisatie ja:欧州宇宙機関 no:Den europeiske romfartsorganisasjonen nds:ESA pl:Europejska Agencja Kosmiczna pt:ESA ro:Agenţia spaţială europeană ru:Европейское космическое агентство sq:Agjencia Hapësinore Evropiane scn:ESA simple:European Space Agency sk:Európska vesmírna agentúra sl:Evropska vesoljska agencija sr:Европска Свемирска Агенција sh:Evropska svemirska agencija fi:Euroopan avaruusjärjestö sv:Europeiska rymdorganisationen vi:Cơ quan vũ trụ Châu Âu tg:Еврокосмос tr:Avrupa Uzay Ajansı uk:Європейське космічне агентство