As part of its “strategic compass”, Europe plans to launch a constellation of satellites to ensure the continuity of the Internet on its territory and to monitor space… from space.
“Our analysis of global threats clearly shows that Europe is in danger”alerted the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, on January 10 in a forum on Project Syndicate. To strengthen its security, the European Commission has decided to present, this Tuesday, February 15, 2022, a regulation on secure connectivity and space traffic management.
Several proposals are made by the Commission, including two major ones. Europe plans to launch a constellation of satellites to ensure Internet connectivity throughout Europe. European sources cited by Le Figaro evoke the possibility of having, until “in the most remote regions of the EU and in Africa”an Internet connection that would be maintained “in the event of a land infrastructure crash”.
Terrestrial redundancy and space security
A new device in Europe, like Starlink, the constellation of the American SpaceX. According to our colleagues, the EU wants to avoid falling behind the major world powers (China, United States). Several relevant orbits and frequencies are starting to be reserved for side projects. Europe also wants to be able to monitor space from its satellites.
Thierry Breton, European Commissioner for the Internal Market, justified the need to have redundant Internet connectivity at European level. “This north-south constellation will make it possible, thanks to several hundreds or thousands of satellites, to connect all of Europe, to secure all of our communications and to have redundancy with our terrestrial networks in the event of cyberattack”he explained on BFM TV, this Monday, February 14.
An autonomous defense
The installation could be operational in 2024 and should cost between five and six billion euros. Funding should be provided by the European Commission, the private sector and the 27 members of the EU.
This new device will reinforce Galileo, the European GPS system, and Copernicus, a satellite visualization program for the earth. The stated goal of these investments is to “to give the European Union the capacity to react autonomously to threats”justifies Josep Borrell, head of European diplomacy.