Snapshot
2008 – Spaceports – Snapshot
Spaceports operate around the world, offering different capabilities and scales of operation. Some spaceports consist of little more than a basic control center, transportation infrastructure, and launch platform. Others are more elaborate, with facilities for payload processing and integration as well as state-of-the-art mission operation centers.
2008 – French Government Space Budget – Snapshot
Priorities for France’s Centre National d’Études Spatiales (CNES) in 2009 include further refinement of the Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) and an ongoing role in developing Europe’s new Vega small launch vehicle. Forty CNES and EADS Astrium engineers spent six months preparing the ATV for its March 2008 flight, which proceeded smoothly. This marked the beginning of operations for the Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) Control Centre in Toulouse, France, which seven months later guided the ATV through a planned destructive re-entry.
2008 – European Space Agency Budget – Snapshot
The European Space Agency (ESA), with 18 member states, had a 2008 budget of about €## billion (US$## billion). ESA is projecting a budget of €## billion (US$## billion) for the three years from 2009–2011. One feature of the budget will be a ##% per year growth in the agency’s basic science budget. The combined civil space spending for 2008, including both national space programs and ESA contributions of the four largest members, Germany, France, Italy, and the United Kingdom, amounted to about €## billion (US$## billion), approximately ##% of their averaged national budgets.
2008 – Chinese Government Space Budget – Snapshot
China’s dramatic space progress in the past decade is linked to growing space expenditures through the civilian China National Space Agency (CNSA). Although China does not publish its civil space budget, in 2005 Luo Ge, the vice administrator of the CNSA, stated that the Chinese space budget was US$## million. Many analysts contend that annual Chinese civil space spending is considerably higher, at least one-tenth that of the United States, or around US$## billion.[
2008 – Canadian Government Space Budget – Snapshot
The Canadian Space Agency oversees an annual budget of about C$## million (US$## million), a figure unchanged for several years. Canada focuses its space spending on three main areas: satellite communication and navigation systems, space robotics, and Earth observation and remote sensing. In 2008, Canada’s space spending constituted approximately ##% of Canada’s C$## billion (US$## billion) national budget.
2008 – Brazilian Government Space Budget – Snapshot
The National Congress of Brazil’s 2009 Federal Budget allocated ## million reais (US$## million) to the Brazilian Space Agency (AEB), a slight increase over the previous year. The AEB is complemented by three smaller space research institutes; the National Institute for Space Research, the Aeronautics and Space Institute, and the Institute for Advanced Studies.
2008 – U.S. Civil Space Budgets – Snapshot
The United States budget for NASA was $## billion in FY 2008 and the budget request for FY 2009 was $## billion. Consistent with past allocations, the FY 2010 budget request of $## billion represents about ##%, or a little more than half a penny for each dollar in the president’s total budget request of $## trillion. Major 2009 activities will include up to five shuttle missions on the path to the planned retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2010, ongoing coordination of final ISS assembly, and a variety of scientific missions. To provide a more detailed view of the NASA program activity, Exhibit 1n shows a summary by program through 2013 based on NASA’s FY 2009 Budget Request, which includes appropriated funds for FY 2008.
2008 – U.S. National Security Space Budgets – Snapshot
As noted, DoD spending represents a majority of U.S. government space funding, yet there is limited clarity regarding what is included in this funding overall or how the funds are broken down between the individual military services. As a result, the Defense Appropriations bill passed by Congress for FY 2008 called on the Pentagon to develop a Major Force Program (MFP) budget category to aggregate space spending in a single budget line, including not only equipment and services procurement, but also research and technology development programs. The FY 2009 budget request submitted to Congress identified $## billion as related to major joint space-based programs, including Space-Based Infrared Systems, communications satellites, GPS satellites, environmental satellites, Advanced Extremely High Frequency satellites, and related launch vehicles.
2008 – United States Government Space Budget – Snapshot
NASA and the DoD, the two largest space agencies in the world, dominate the U.S. space budget. The budgets for these two represent ##% of estimated U.S. government space funding. When estimates of all U.S. defense-related space activities are combined, the total is $## billion, or ##% of total U.S. government space funding. This figure includes space budget estimates for DoD, the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), and the Missile Defense Agency. DoD space spending, combined with the budgets of these additional defense agencies, plus NASA make up ##% of the U.S. government space budget. In addition to NASA, civil space programs of the Department of Energy, the Federal Aviation Administration, the National Science Foundation, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration provide an additional $## billion of U.S. government space funding.
2008 – Government Space Budgets – Snapshot
Throughout the world, large-scale space programs, particularly those tied to national scientific or defense programs, are heavily supported by government budgets. Government spending accounted for ##% of global space activity in 2008. The United States accounted for ##% of this global government spending. Space budgets for other governments rose nearly ##% in U.S. dollars, though actual growth was closer to ##% when adjusted for currency fluctuations.