UK: The British government has agreed to invest 15 million British pounds ($25 million) in two French satellite Earth observation programmes — one being run with the United States the other with European governments — as part of a bilateral framework agreement punctuating the growing space policy relations between the two nations.
The heads of the two nations’ space agencies have signed agreements that will see British scientists enter into partnership with France for the IASI Next Generation instrument for Europe’s weather satellite organisation, Eumetsat. The agreement also commits Britain to investing 7.5 million pounds into the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) satellite being developed by CNES, the French space agency, and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory for a launch in 2020. The SWOT spacecraft is a follow-on to the 20-year Jason line of ocean-topography satellites that started as a bilateral CNES-NASA program but has extended to include the U.S. and European weather satellite agencies.
Source: Space News
