Events and Information resources

 

02/03/04. Europe's comet chaser Rosetta was successfuly deployed in space after launch in the morning of 02/03/04. "The launch went absolutely perfectly," Jean-Yves Le Gall, chief executive of launch operators Arianespace, said from Kourou. "Rosetta has been placed in a perfect orbit... this achievement marks the renewal of Europe's mission in space." "Another mission is on its way to explore the Universe," ESA Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain said, as he ticked off the current European probes sent to explore the Moon, Mars and Saturn, with Venus to follow suit next year. "Rosetta is a masterpiece of technology."
This clearly demonstrates that Europe, as soon as it has scientific projects to realize and some money for this, is perfectly competitive.
See from ESA http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/SEMFG42PGQD_UnitedKingdom_0.html

18/02/04. Berlin summit and scientific research in Europe. During the so-said "Berlin Summit" (18 February 2004), MM Schroeder, Blair and Chirac have confirmed the necessity of enhancing scientific research in Europe, in order to help economic growth and social prosperity. Very well. It is good to hear from heads of governments what you repeat daily. But this has been proclaimed previously by the Communication "Investing in research : an action plan for Europe" adopted by the European Commission on 30 April 2003, following a first Communication "More research for Europe - Towards 3 % of GDP" adopted in 2002 (see http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/en/com/cnc/2003/com2003_0226en02.pdf). And what will be decided accordingly, since (for example) Germany and France have recently decided to limit the European budget to 1% of GDP?
In Europe, generally speaking, when governments decide, nothing happen. On the contrary, when US federal government decide, everybody comply, at least when national sovereignty is at stakes. On European research budget, see our paper http://www.admiroutes.asso.fr/europepuissancescientifique/recheur.htm)

10/01/04 : Mars will be american. President Bush proposes the landing of an american crew on Mars as the New Frontier pour the next decades. This issue will enhance civil and military sciences and technologies, and is expected to provoke american citizens' enthousiasm among . European politics appear now to be strongly tempted to join the US, even as subordonate parners, instead of promoting a similar and truly european Mars project - which could be quite affordable say european space experts.

Let us add than if ESA has registered a succes with the launch of the probe Mars Express, now orbiting, this succes has been obliterated, in the media, by the failure of Beagle 2. On the contrary, the safe landing of the Nasa robot Spirit has been celebrated the world over. It is necessary to remember however that the Nasa budget for this operation was 12 times higher than the european funding. (see our paper, in french)

9/01/04 : ITER. The US secretary of energy announces publicly that the Japanese site proposed for Iter (Rokkasho-Mura) is much more convenient that the european site (Cadarache, Fr.). It is difficult to day to guess what will be the european, russian and chinese answer. A good solution could be, since it appears difficult to expect that the US and Japan could accept ITER in Europe, that european and partners develop their own site in Cadarache. This would be much more feasible than it looks, and would promote an international network of thermonuclear research centers, which would be better than monopole (see our paper, in french).

December 2003 : The last World Summit on Information Society has practically been a failure. Europe has once again missed the opportunity to help reduce the gap between Third World and developped countries (see our paper, in french).

November-Décember 2003 : Kyoto Protocol is dying. European ONGs propose a new Protocol, which could be much more efficient. It is called C&C for Contraction and Convergence. But will Europe try to keep with C&C its leadership in bringning the emission of greenhouse gases under control ? (see our paper, in french).

 

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