ESA Lays Out Ambitious Vision Ahead of New Budget Decision

The 2025 meeting of the ESA Council at the Ministerial Level (CM25) will begin on November 26th at 13:30 CET. What will follow is a two day meeting of the space ministers of various ESA member states in order to decide the agency’s budget for the next three years, approve or continue major initiatives, and decide how much each nation will commit to various programs for the 3 year period. Representatives of ESA and its Directorates will lay their pitches on the table and engage in both public speeches and backroom trades to secure their priorities. Much of European spaceflight, even private and commercial, is keyed to these 3 year cycles that are often prerequisites for ESA programs to truly get underway, but for those who are unfamiliar the process can seem strange and confusing.

As laid out by the agency’s founding treaty, ESA projects fall under either mandatory or optional programs, much like how many nations have mandatory and discretionary spending categories in their national budgets. The mandatory programs consist of the Space Science program and ESA’s general budget, used for administrative work, concept studies, some technology funding, and so on. Mandatory programs are funded by all member states at a level proportional to their Gross National Product. All other activities, including Galileo, Sentinel and other earth science missions, their ISS and Artemis support, ground stations, and more are considered optional. Optional programs must be opted into by each funding state and each state is free to decide its level of contribution. The majority of the drama and uncertainty going into any CM meeting is based on the various optional programs competing to pick up enough funding to achieve their near term goals, with the remainder being decisions about the direction of the Space Science program. ESA has also provided a summary of the council’s procedures ahead of the event.

CM25 in particular is interesting because of the wide breadth of ambitious plans in the balance, so the best way to preview is to go directorate by directorate to see their pitches.

Space Science

As may be expected from the only mandatory flight program, Space Science’s aims are largely straightforward. Their main goals are to complete the Cosmic Vision science program (launches of these missions began with JUICE in 2023 and will continue out through the mid 2030s) and begin work on the following Voyage 2050 program. Completion of the LISA gravitational wave observatory and NewAthena X-ray telescope are major thrusts of Cosmic Vision, and progressing into Voyage 2050 requires approval of the so-far unnamed L4 mission to Enceladus. Previously covered almost 2 years ago by Space Scout, L4 aims to use two Ariane 64s to assemble an Enceladus Orbiter/Lander and Solar-Electric Propulsion (SEP) transfer stage in low-earth orbit before sending it to the Saturnian system in the mid 2040s. While feasible, it will require significant attention and technology development, so approving the mission as soon as possible is essential to ensure success.

Human and Robotic Exploration

Charged with ESA’s human spaceflight and deep space infrastructure missions, HRE has a full plate of plans and ideas. Near Earth, they want funding and approval for the LCRS commercial ISS resupply program, serious looks into domestic crewed spaceflight capabilities, and suggested that in the longer term they seek a European space station. At the Moon, they aim to prolong the Argonaut series of lunar landers, continue their contributions to Gateway and Orion, and deploy the Moonlight constellation of relay satellites. At Mars, the launch and operation of the Rosalind Franklin surface mission is the top priority, and they are asking for approval of the ZefERO mission (a repurposing of Mars Sample Return’s Earth Return Orbiter to study winds and act as a relay) and the LightShip series of space tugs and infrastructure orbiters. They have also produced a factsheet summarizing their proposals.

Earth Observation

Earth Observation takes the lion’s share of ESA’s budget, and is composed mainly of the Copernicus space segment and Earth Explorer science missions. Copernicus is the EU’s earth observation program using the 6 series of Sentinel satellites. Earth Explorers are ESA-ran science missions that study forests, climate change, the water cycle, ice, and more. Over the next 5 years, Copernicus will have 6 more sets of satellites join and ESA will continue selecting and flying Earth Explorer and smaller missions. They are also seeking approval for the Next-Generation Gravity Mission, which aims to map ocean circulation in great detail.

Space Transportation

The home of ESA’s support for the European launch industry, Space Transportation is one of the most visible (and controversial) components and has its own pitches. With the increasing geopolitical importance of autonomous space access and the ever present increase in satellite usage, Ariane 6 and Vega-C are attempting to ramp up to full capacity. To encourage diversity and competitiveness in the industry, the European Launcher Challenge will provide assured access and competition for Ariane. With reusability now fully justified in the eyes of policymakers, technology development and demonstration is needed to ensure an Ariane 6 successor is ready when it will be needed in the mid 2030s.

Navigation

A major area of collaboration with the EU, ESA designs and launches the Galileo navigation satellites and is currently working on the “G2” next-generation spacecraft. Future evolutions vying for attention include Celeste (a LEO constellation of navigation satellites) and the idea of adding laser inter-satellite links to aid time transfer and ranging in order to improve accuracy. They also want to send NovaMOON, the first differential PNT (a method of using a ground station to improve satellite navigation accuracy nearby) station on the moon, on the first flight of Argonaut in 2030.

Operations

ESA’s operations directorate is responsible for the ground-based infrastructure of the agency and the Space Safety Program, which includes Space Weather monitoring, space debris management, and planetary defense. Their current major projects include Active Debris Removal and In-space Servicing missions and the Vigil space weather observatory. The need for a new deep space ground station to support the increased data output of science and exploration missions is also apparent.

ESA sees a golden opportunity to reshape the narrative around Europe’s space presence and place themselves as a true equal among the world’s large space agencies, but their ability to execute on those promises depends on the willingness and ability of their member states to fund them. The only way to know will be to follow along with CM25 on November 26-27, and the best of luck to ESA in emerging from this crossroads empowered to meet their dreams.

Acronyms

• CM25 – ESA Council at the Ministerial Level, 2025
• LISA – Laser Interferometer Space Antenna
• PNT – Position, Navigation, and Timing
• SEP – Solar Electric Propulsion