EU's delayed satnav system to take off in 2014
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The EU gave a boost to its much-delayed Galileo satellite navigation system today as contracts worth a total of over 1 billion euros were awarded to enable the system to be up and running by 2014. Critics, however, are raising concerns over the spiralling cost.
The Galileo project is intended to be a rival to the US Global Positioning System (GPS). With more advanced technology, the network of satellites is expected to be much quicker and more accurate than its American counterpart.
Galileo was originally planned to be operational already, but a series of problems with funding, political cooperation and technology have put the project seriously behind schedule.
At one point in 2007 the plan came within a hair's breadth of being scrapped altogether as the public-private partnership put in place to fund it collapsed. It was only saved after the EU agreed to pay for the entire project.
And in time of economic crisis, EU taxpayers may not be very pleased to hear that the total cost has spiralled dramatically and it is now predicted to exceed €5 billion euros. In its quest to find the money the EU has even had to tap into funds from the bloc's massive agricultural budget.
The EU argues that the economic benefits the project will eventually bring justify the current cost, but some remain sceptical. Only once the first systems become operational in 2014 will users be able to judge for themselves if the effort and expense was truly worth it.
