Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 4.3
State expenditure
on space exploration
a
Country/group $US million
United States 17,700
Russia 5,600
ESA
b
5,380
France 2,822
Japan 2,460
Germany 2,000
India 1,320
China 1,300
Italy 1,000
Iran 500
Canada 489
United Kingdom 414
World total
40,600
a
As compiled by Wikipedia -
http://en.wiki-
b
The national budgets shown for European
contributors to ESA are separate from their
contributions to ESA
after India proposed its own human spacefl ight programme and the United States,
Russia, Japan, India, China and the European Space Agency (ESA
2
) all have plans
for future lunar expeditions.
3.1
Space Exploration
National activities related to space exploration are organised through governmental
space agencies. The offi cial 2011 annual budgets for national space agencies around
the world are shown in Table
4.3
.
The national space agency budgets shown in Table
4.3
are used differently by
different nations. For example, the US Global Positioning System is maintained
from its defence budget, while ESA's money is used for developing the European
Galileo positioning system.
Cooperation and rivalry in space usually mirror the geopolitical patterns on
Earth, and partnerships develop out of political and commercial interests. For
example, the United States is working on a number of space projects
3
and space
2
The member states of the ESA are Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France,
Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain,
Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
3
See, for example, '
A Remarkable Expansion of US-India Cooperation on Science & Technology'
a media note from the US State Department - available at
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/
ps/2013/06/211028.htm
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