London

The European Union (EU) is planning a satellite-based global navigation system that will rival the US-operated Global Positioning System (GPS).

Transport ministers from EU states agreed last week to spend 100 million euros ($88 million) on developing the new system, called Galileo. The EU and European Space Agency (ESA) are expected to release a further 1 billion euros later this year. Another 2.1 billion euros will be needed for the system, which will involve launching at least 20 satellites between 2005 and 2008.

Europe aims to depend less on GPS for transportation, science and other purposes, partly because the US military restricts access to its highest-precision capabilities.

Jim Davis, a geologist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who uses GPS, says the European system will be welcomed if it delivers more resolution than GPS. “Scientists need more accurate knowledge about the position of the satellites than the military does,” he says.

Galileo could provide quick, precise measurements. “Its real difference is speed,” says Hans Fromm, head of navigation at ESTEC, an ESA laboratory in Noordwijk, the Netherlands. “It takes hours to get an accurate fix from GPS. Galileo should be able to do it in ten minutes or so.” Researchers are expected to have free access to the system.