Kinnock seeks funds for satellite navigation system

Date: 04/02/1999

By Renée Cordes

TRANSPORT Commissioner Neil Kinnock will next week ask Union governments and industry to spend up to €2.9 billion on developing a European space and land-based satellite transport navigation system.

The move is aimed at giving the Union a foothold in an international communications market set to generate annual sales worth €45 billion within the next few years.

By transmitting signals at given intervals, the satellites would help airplanes, ships and trucks pinpoint exactly where they were. As a result, they could save fuel costs, improve safety and reduce pollution.

But Kinnock's plan is likely to face tough opposition from EU governments which have repeatedly blocked the Commission's attempts to increase public spending on transport.

Critics contend that Europe has no realistic chance of ever catching up with the US, which is already developing a second, more advanced generation of satellite technology, and say the price tag for deploying European satellites is more likely to reach around €10 billion.

"If they can demonstrate a believable case for that kind of investment, then governments and private business may be willing to take the risk," said one EU diplomat. "But a large degree of scepticism has to be overcome."

Kinnock will call next week for the establishment of a European satellite network as part of the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), which is expected to become operational within the next few years.

Rather than relying on existing military satellites, the institution argues that a civil European system would ensure lower costs and better service. This would supplement or replace conventional navigation systems which are currently run at national level.