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Space Science

US Space Station Cuts Hurts Canada's Space Science 28

Posted by timothy from the unintended-consequences dept.
Darwin O'Connor writes: "This article from The Toronto Star says that cutbacks in US Space Station budget reduces the amount of science that can be done on the Space Station to the point that the international partners, like Canada, Japan and the EU will not be given the science time they agreed to in exchange for thier contrabutions to the project."
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US Space Station Cuts Hurts Canada's Space Science More

US Space Station Cuts Hurts Canada's Space Science

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  • Arrianne (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Oily Tuna ( 542581 )

    Okay ... so we just accelerate the Arrianne, Indian, Japanese and Chinese manned programs, go up there and let ourselves in.

    Did the US leave the key under the mat?

  • At the risk of souding US-centric... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Dimwit ( 36756 ) on Monday December 10, 2001 @01:04PM (#2682582)
    ...which would be odd, considering I live in Luxembourg...I have the distinct impression everyone kind of expects the US to pay for everything. (For example, everyone's pissed that the US isn't paying what it's supposed to for the UN. That sounds bad, until you realize that the US was supposed to pay 25% of the operating costs by itself, with the other 200 some-odd members paying much, much less.)

    The European Union is, if taken as a whole, the largest economy in the world. The European Space Agency could pony up some money for this. I don't see why the US should get suck with an unfair portion of the bills...

    • The point is that the USA did not pay for everything. However when they cut back their budgets they also denied other parties access to the station that was jointly paid for by the USA and other nations. Canada paid $1.4 Billion for their part of the stations and now they don't get to use it. The changes that USA is proposing are in direct violation of an agreement they had signed.

      • The point is that the USA did not pay for everything. However when they cut back their budgets they also denied other parties access to the station that was jointly paid for by the USA and other nations. Canada paid $1.4 Billion for their part of the stations and now they don't get to use it. The changes that USA is proposing are in direct violation of an agreement they had signed.


        Only because they lose access to the US space shuttle. They could ask the Russians to fly them up there. There's also the issue that the US had to pay quite a bit more than it originally intended to because the Russians reneged on a lot of their payments. The other signatory parties need to complain to Russia, not the US.
        • This is dead on. The US budgeted over $25 Billion for the station (I'm not sure if that includes the use of the Shuttle) compared to Canada's $1.5 billion. Now there are huge cost overruns to the tune of $5-10 billion and the US has said we aren't going to pay it. A lot of these overruns are due to the Russians not pulling their weight, but I don't hear Canada eager to pick up the extra tab.

          The nations have already agreed to rules for bringing non-astronauts on board, so why doesn't Canada shell out a couple of million to Russia for a ride on a Soyuz.

          • I believe your trying to argue that since the USA paid it's contractors a larger sum of money than other countries that they should have sole ownership of the station. This seems unreasonable as the USA signed agreements to provide its partners with access to the station with prior knowledge of how much each country was contributing.

            The USA would no doubt not care that it is paying more because the $25 billion it budgeted was going to US contractors, and many of the partner countries also paid substantial amount to US contractors. A boost for the US economy all the way around. Pay $25 and get $30 out of the deal!

            Now the dollar figures I don't think can be compared directly without in depth analysis. The USA has a history of overpaying, sometimes in the extreme, aerospace contractors and have had many failures in space recently. I think many suspect ineffeciency and ineffectiveness on the part of the USA in this endevour. What would the European nations or Canada delivered for US$25 billion? Would it have taken as long? Would they have been more effecient? It would certainly be in metric! ;-) Perhaps the USA did do a good job, however no one here can determine that. It's not possible to reasonable compare each nations contribution.

            Each nation did contribute, and they had an agreement as to how the station would be used. The USA economy got an economic boast from the construction of the station. It got countless billions from it's own government, and more from other governments as well. The US economy has benefited, and now it's government refuses to provide the partners what they agreed to. Their breaking their word.

            • Gosh, from what you are saying it sounds like the US twisted everyone's arm to get them onboard with the ISS. If the US had wanted our own space station we certainly could have done that, but the ISS is supposed to be buit and run by a coalition of countries. Like Canada the US has already made the agreed upon contirbution and then some. The US has been picking up the slack for the Russians for some time now. At this point no one wants to spend more money, and everyone will hae to make sacfrifices. It seems perfectly fair that those that made the smallest contributions should make the biggest sacrifice.

              Why do you think the ISS had such a great effect on the US economy. Surely any effect on the economy would have been greater if it was the USSS and not the ISS. AFAIK the parts of the ISS made by the other countries were made in those countries, and not by some US government "approved" list of contractors.

              The fact of the matter is that the ISS is now costing more and taking longer than anyone anticipated. The US is not going to bear all of that cost ourselves, if Canada does not want to pay in dollars, they will pay in the form of reduced access to the station.
          • Let's look at some statistics.

            Canada
            GDP: (US$) 603.1 billion (1997)
            GNP (US$): 583.9 billion (1997)

            USA
            GDP: (US$) 7,819.3 billion (1997)
            GNP (US$): 7,690.1 billion (1997)

            It would appear that the US has approx 11x the economic output.

            To me, it doesn't seem so suprising that the US pay ~11x more than Canada, based on that alone.

            In any case, I agree that expecting the US to pay for all of the extra is unwise, but on the other hand, to complain that the US pay more? Why does Texas have more represntatives than Rhode Island?
    • It shouldn't be based on economy size, but on the number of problems in the world you cause OR are involved in (takes 2 sides to have a war). If you go by that number I'm fairly sure the US 25% is closer to the mark.
      • Wow, so should Afghanistan be ponying up right now? How about Saudi Arabia? Israel? Pakistan? Serbia?
        Right.....
        • Yes, I believe they should.

          The UN is an insurance policy. Those benefiting from insurance more often pay higher rate than those who don't. Then again, Afghanistan really isn't benefitting from anything are they -- but you can't argue that the US didn't benefit (corporation policy wise anyway) considering the number of dumbass things pushed out under the 'fighting terrorists' clauses that were really for advertising, etc.
      • It shouldn't be based on economy size, but on the number of problems in the world you cause OR are involved in (takes 2 sides to have a war). If you go by that number I'm fairly sure the US 25% is closer to the mark.

        Let me get this straight. The more conflicts you "are involved in", the more you should pay the UN to send you off into conflicts? The US fights under a UN mandate in the '91 Gulf War, causing a whole host of problems (mostly the result of leaving the losers alive to be pissed off about it), and so ought to contribute more to the UN so it can afford to send ... um ... the US off to ... well ... fulfill UN mandates. Conversely, the US did squat to stop the genocide in Rwanda, and so don't have to pony up nothin'.

        Hey, I like you plan! The more the US attacks helpless little villagers, the bigger its Attack Helpless Villager budget gets!

    • This is OT, but I'll rant nonetheless

      On the UN, you're forgetting a few things.. first, the US is a founding member of the organization, and certainly had much sway in the decisions regarding the dues calculations. The US is supposed to pay 1/4 of the UN's budget because it's economic output is approximatly 1/4 of the world's economic output, and the UN is a worldwide organization. You mentioned that the EU together forms the largest economy in the world. Have you looked at the total UN dues of EU members?

      Second, until very recently the US wasn't simply not paying what it was supposed to, it wasn't paying at all. After years of nonpayment, it agreed to pay only part of its back-payments in return for a downward change in its dues calculations.

      Third, the US has, throughout the life of the UN made extensive use of the UN when it was most expedient, and continues to exert great influence in UN decisions - witness the ousting of Boutros Boutros-Ghali by US veto or the active hinderence of intervention in Rwanda.
  • It sounds like it's time for some more rich businessmen to brush up on their lab-skills. Didn't the last guy wind up doing some grunt-work? I suppose these experiments take lots of training and practice to perform in 0g, but hey, a warm body is a warm body, as they used to say in the boom.
  • Why we (Canada) need our own shuttle.

    Or may be we could split 1/2 with Japan or something.

    But if the Govt. will not relpace Sea King's, I guess a shuttle si out of the question. So we are stuck hitching rides.

    Anybody know the price tag on a shuttle ? (used will do)
  • Is the typical /.'er American and are they concerned about this? I'm Canadian, so I care about it, but Canadian stories don't get front-page /. billing very often. I'd like to see a poll of /. nationalities. I wonder how many people live in Cowboy Neal.

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