Slashdot Mirror
EU Presses Ahead With Galileo GPS System
philkerr writes "The BBC is reporting that European transport ministers have agreed to the 2008 deployment of the European controlled GPS system. Costing 2.1 billion euros and creating 150,000 jobs. Is this just a pork-barrel project, or something Europe really needs to break the reliance on U.S. space technology? This was discussed on Slashdot in June when the U.S. and EU reached an agreement on its deployment."
You seem to have missed out the part about improving accuracy and reliability.
I couldn't give a monkey about the politics, but anything that improves the signal makes me happy.
One of the slick things that the Europeans did in designing the Galileo system is that they used very nearly the same frequencies as GPS, which makes it very easy for a consumer device to use both systems at the same time and therefor gaining a lot of accuracy. As an aside, it makes it impossible to jam one without jamming the other.
By comparison the UK debt is 33% of GDP and the euro countries had deficit targets they had to meet (but often fudged) to join the single currency in the first place.
The next country to suffer reversal of fortunes and crippling problems is likely to be the US: no plans as to how to deal with your deficit, big costs coming up, and no good will around the world.
A quote from the article:
These technical parameters will allow either side to effectively jam the other's signal in a small area, such as a battlefield, without shutting down the entire system.
So jamming should not take any longer than it does currently.....
Due to the rollout of WAAS (Wide Area Augmentation System), there are a growing number of airports in the country which have GPS approaches. WAAS provides accurate enough GPS signal correction (from ground based stations) to provide full auto-land functionality for so-equipped airliners.
This is a reality _today_, and requires nothing from the Europeans, or waiting until 2008.
As a side note, directed more to the lurkers, what no one seems to consider is that there are many navigational systems which pre-date GPS. ILS and Loran signals, for example, are NOT encrypted, and do NOT have selective availability.
If you're not living on the edge, you're just taking up space!
With USA being driven into the ground, The euro is quickly replacing the dollar as the stable money. With more money flowing to Europe, they will be able to afford large ticket items. This launch will give them a shot in the arm that they need to establish their rockets and truely create a space industry.
Our (US) system has the fault that the DOD can turn it off whenever they see fit. In particualar, one of the problems that we want to go to "free skies". That is the airplanes would be free to decide how and where to travel guided by GPS. Great concept, but one huge flaw. The DOD can turn off GPS whenever they see fit. So imagine the sky filled with planes and then the GPS goes off. Ooops. Europe's system is probably the one to go to.
This bad for us dominence, but great for business, Europe, and the World as a whole.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
First, around 3 trillion dollars of the debt is intragovernment. That is, the government borrows from the money that is needed to pay the house insurance at the end of the year to pay the light bill now. All of us that have had to do this know it is a dangerous game. Although many say we can always borrow more money to extend term with creditors, this part of the debt has not been borrowed.
The rest, exceeding $4 trillion and approaching 5, is held publicly. The figures I have seen indicate that foreign ownership is approaching 50%. Now, I don't know who many of you are in debt, but if you are you know the people who you owe money to own you. It the 70's the citizens of the US own the country. Now Japan does. I am not being chauvinistic, just realistic. If we owe several billion dollars to someone, then we are not going to do a lot to piss that person off. We may act macho in the UN, or shake out fists in Iraq, but that is mostly just our temper tantrums because we cannot have everything we want.
Currently the US appears to be taxing at 15% of GDP and spending at 20%. Our lifestyle depends on other countries lending us money. We are no longer our own man.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
yes, they do.
;)
1st. it's good to be independent (you never know when bush shuts-off the gps for non-us use)
2nd. it's good to have backups (good for the eu and the us)
3rd. it's cool
Privacy is terrorism.
Many of the posters here seem to think that the US is opposed to the Galileo system because the technology will be "better" than the current GPS system.
I don't believe that. If the US military-industrial complex was worried about superior foreign technology, they would have already bombed Toyota, Honda, Sony, etc. out of existence!
The American military is worried that a system such as Galileo allows much, much simpler creation of missile and other automatically guided weapons systems. The current GPS system supports "selective availability" where the accuracy can be deliberately degraded during times or war or other threats.
The Galileo partners should be worried that when the American military feels threatened, the usual "shoot first, ask questions later" philosophy will prevail, and the Galileo system will be jammed or destroyed to protect American interests. (At that same time, the current GPS system would be deliberately degraded or disabled.) I would bet money on that.
there are 3 kinds of people:
* those who can count
* those who can't