**4.2.2 Funding**

The next obstacle is the difficulty to convince politicians to allocate sufficient funds for space exploration. The funding of costly projects like telecommunication satellites, high-resolution earth observation satellites, or launchers is easier to justify on economic, strategic or security-related grounds. Although space exploration projects can be defended for their technological returns in the long run, spill-over effects, reversing brain-drain and promoting science, and their positive psychological effects on the public, securing the necessary funds is not easy. Most space exploration missions are extremely costly, for example, NASA's

How Newcomers Will Participate in Space Exploration 21

and launched by US launch vehicles in 1999 and 2004, respectively. Formosat-3, aka, COSMIC (Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere, and Climate) was launched in 2006 and consisted of six spacecrafts. Taiwanese and US agencies not only shared the cost but also shared the data gathered from these ionospheric research satellites. On this project, Taiwan has mainly focused on payload development and benefitted from reliable, qualified US launch vehicles and the widely distributed US ground station network. Although only one of the satellites remains active today, the technology that Taiwanese institutions developed and hands on experience for NSPO employees paved the way for the Formosat-5 program, involving joint Taiwan-Canada-Japan collaboration and

The cooperation between ESA and other countries is another example. ESA has relationships with non-European countries such as Argentina, Brazil, China, Japan, India, Canada, US and Russia. Argentina is different from the others with respect to its space capabilities, however, the country benefits from its geographical location and supports ESA's future deep space missions to Mars and beyond. In return, ESA provides joint

The EU Framework Programs is another example. The 7th Framework Program (2007 - 2013) is open to non-EU countries such as Turkey, Israel, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Croatia, Macedonia, Serbia, Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia & Herzegovina and the Faroe Islands. The FP7 Space Work Programme covers areas like "Space Exploration" and "RTD for Strengthening Space Foundations" (European Union, 2006). If these countries could succeed in becoming partners to space projects, in theory they would also be able to jointly develop key technologies. However, in practicality, it is not easy to take part in such projects due to the requirements of space heritage for products and compatibility with mainly ESA driven international standards such as The European Cooperation for Space Standardization (ECSS) and Consultative Committee for Space

Regional cooperation is another type of cooperation for which ESA is a very bright example. Two such initiatives in Asia are the APRSAF led by Japan and APSCO led by China. In these cases, at least one nation possesses launch vehicle capability and existing distributed ground

Another example is International Space Exploration Coordination Group (ISECG) formed by 14 space agencies, namely Italian, French, Chinese, Canadian, Australian, US, UK, German, European, Indian, Japanese, Korean, Ukrainian and Russian space agencies in 2007. ISECG aims to formalize the vision for future robotic and human space exploration to solar system destinations, starting from the Moon and Mars, based on voluntary work approach and exchange information regarding the named space agencies' interests, plans and activities in space exploration with their "The Global Exploration Strategy: The Framework for Coordination" approach. ISECG is a good model for newcomers to pursue the way ahead for joint outer space exploration and be part of the coordination, basically to eliminate the

On the other hand, regardless of the composition or existence of partners, there are technological solutions that can reduce costs or increase launch options. An important revolutionary mission is SMART-1, an ESA-funded satellite developed by the Swedish

also resulted in an efficient use of resources.

Data Systems (CCSDS).

station networks are needed.

duplication in this area.

training courses for Argentinean students in various areas.

recent mission to Jupiter costed 1.1 billion US dollars. Most newcomers have difficulty in fronting that kind of expenditure. Even the Indian Space Agency, ISRO, who has had tremendous success in their space programs, is having difficulty to defend budget allocation for future Chandrayaan programs.
