‘You cannot live without space in 20 years’: What does the future of Europe’s economy look like?

euronews (in English)

“20 years ago, nobody would have ever imagined the dimension of what the internet brings today for daily life and I think space is in a similar situation,” Josef Aschbacher, director general of the European Space Agency, told The Big Question.

Transcript

00:00Space will be everywhere. You cannot live without space in 20 years from today.

00:04One euro invested in space programs brings about five euro back to the economy.

00:14Welcome to The Big Question, the series from Euronews where we explore every corner of the

00:18world of business. Today I'm joined by the Director General of the European Space Agency,

00:22Josef Aschbacher. Thank you very much for joining me today. So in recent years the image of space

00:27travel has gained a reputation as a bit of a billionaire's boys club. Do you think the private

00:31space industry plays an important role in the space industry globally? Private industry will

00:35play a major role but it is also clear that private industry will not succeed without public

00:42investments. Take the example of SpaceX. SpaceX being the largest space company today in the world

00:48but they have been built up thanks to a very strong support of NASA both in terms of funding.

00:55NASA has provided huge amounts of funding to build up and develop projects but also expertise.

01:00So yes, we need private investment, we need to attract venture capital funding, we need to attract

01:05funding from outside the public domain, absolutely, and I'm working very hard on this also in Europe

01:11but it has to go hand in hand with European programs that give the objective that what we

01:16want to do, we want to go to the space station, we want to go to the moon, we want to go to Mars,

01:20and then we engage private industry and buy a service from them. But we have to really make

01:24sure that we have the long-term vision, the long-term programs, and the funding to enable it.

01:28Yeah, absolutely. Why is ESA's work important work that needs to be publicly funded?

01:33Oh, it's extremely important. Sometimes I make a comparison, I say, look, if I would have asked you

01:3920 years ago, do you need the internet? You would have said yes, sounds very exciting,

01:45sounds very fancy, it may be good for something, but 20 years ago nobody would have ever imagined

01:51the dimension of what the internet brings today for daily life, for everything. And I think space

01:55is a bit in a similar situation. Today, of course, space is already utilized in many disciplines,

02:01but in 20 years from today I can assure you that space will be everywhere. It will connect people,

02:06it will observe our planet, and many other things will be assisted with space technology. In other

02:11words, you cannot live without space in 20 years from today. Already today you cannot live without

02:16space, but in 20 years even more. And this has economic aspects, societal aspects, geopolitical

02:21aspects, also security aspects, last but not least also inspiration of people, because if you have

02:27cool space programs, young people tend to work there and not leave the country or leave the

02:32continent. I saw at the age of seven years the moon landing, and this changed my mindset. It

02:40convinced me that this is something I want to work when I'm growing up, and I'm still fascinated

02:44every single day. So yes, space is very important for the European Space Agency, but

02:49actually for every citizen in Europe and worldwide.

02:58All these brilliant programs and research and stuff that you do here at ESA,

03:02it's not cheap. But how much does it actually cost?

03:04It is very cheap. The ESA budget is about 8 billion per year. So if you compare this figure

03:10and put it in context with what is spent in the U.S., NASA has a budget of about 25 billion per

03:14year. We have in ESA one third of the NASA budget. But having said that, we do have a huge output for

03:20what we do. Last year we had a record number of 13 satellites that we have launched. We had the

03:26inaugural flight of Ariane 6. We had the return to flight of Vega-C, and all of this has been

03:31successful. We have two flagship programs today that are Copernicus and Galileo. They are the

03:36best programs in the world. Galileo delivers the most accurate signal for navigation worldwide.

03:42It's more accurate than GPS, despite the fact that Galileo was developed 20 years after

03:47GPS was already on the market. The very same happens in Copernicus. We have the most comprehensive

03:53observation of our planet, and we deliver 350 terabytes of data to the globe of what happens

03:59on our planet. Again, it's the best Earth observation program in the world. So I think

04:02this is something that shows that we do with a relatively modest amount of money a lot of

04:07deliverables in terms of space infrastructure. And I think this is something that Europe can be very

04:11proud of, because this is money very well invested. Yeah, and for that investment from the member

04:16states in Europe, how does ESA contribute to the European economy? We've asked some consultancy

04:22companies to assess how much one euro invested in space is bringing back to the economy.

04:27Depends a little bit on the domain. In Earth observation or in weather forecasting,

04:31the economic impact is higher as compared to technology development. But across the board,

04:37one euro invested in space infrastructure or space programs brings about five euro back to the

04:42economy. More recently, I've seen one example of the Arctic Weather Satellite, which we've just

04:47launched last year. One euro invested in this Arctic Weather Satellite constellation, it's at

04:53the moment with one satellite, but there's a future constellation that can be built up,

04:56can bring economic values 50 times higher than the investment. Brilliant. All the work that

05:01actually happens in space, so the programs and the missions and the satellites and things,

05:05how do they benefit us in our economy? WCHILL is a very interesting mission because it's

05:09monitoring space weather. In this particular case, the solar flares that come from the sun.

05:14So if there's a strong solar storm or solar flare, it can impact our infrastructure on planet Earth.

05:21That means electric systems, even in space, the electronics can be damaged. So we need to know

05:27when such a solar flare is about to erupt and there's a certain intensity that it could harm

05:32our infrastructure. So WCHILL is actually one of two satellites. One is built by ESA, the WCHILL,

05:38another one by NASA. And with these two satellites, you can really determine much earlier

05:43when a strong solar eruption would come and therefore have an impact on infrastructure,

05:49either in space of satellites or the space station or on Earth for the electrical grid,

05:54which is one of the elements that is at risk. How expensive is something like this? And then

05:58what would be the projective savings from us gaining that forewarning? The cost of such a

06:03satellite is in the order of a few hundred million, which is certainly an investment to be

06:07made. But if you can imagine of how much you can save by protecting infrastructure on the ground

06:13and therefore minimizing damage that can happen through a solar eruption, then there's a multiple

06:18factor in between. Let me just take one example. Because we do not yet have WCHILL in orbit and

06:23therefore we do not yet have this information. Recently, there was a solar storm that was

06:28unexpected, which resulted in the damage of tens of satellites that have just been launched. And

06:34the solar wind literally pushed it from orbit into the atmosphere and therefore they deorbited

06:40because they could not be rescued. This was unexpected and unprepared. And of course,

06:45you can imagine several tens of satellites cost much more money than one satellite necessary in

06:51order to monitor such a solar storm and therefore be well prepared. And finally, on a personal level,

06:58what are you most excited about in ESA's future? ESA is an incredibly powerful organization in

07:05terms of delivering. ESA is very efficient in terms of use of taxpayers' money and the impact

07:11it creates for the economy and for people's daily life. That is connecting people, that is driving

07:16people in the sense of giving them the navigation signals. So there I really see ESA and space in

07:22Europe to become an essential part of the future economy and the future society. And maybe in many

07:28cases not visible because satellites are up there and you do not know that your navigation

07:35signal needs satellites, but you use them and you rely on them. But it really will enable the

07:40functioning of our society and make Europe powerful, richer and certainly more successful.

07:46Okay, brilliant. Well, thank you so much for sharing this exciting work with me today

07:50and for joining me on The Big Question. Thank you.

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