 ESTEC buildings in Noordwijk, Netherlands |
|
| Abbreviation | ESTEC |
|---|---|
| Location | Noordwijk, Netherlands |
| Parent organization | European Space Agency |
| Website | www.esa.int/estec |
The European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) is the European Space Agency's main technology development and test centre for spacecraft and space technology. It is situated in Noordwijk, South Holland, in the western Netherlands.
At ESTEC, about 2500 engineers, technicians and scientists work hands-on with mission design, spacecraft and space technology. ESTEC provides extensive testing facilities to verify the proper operation of spacecraft, such as the Large Space Simulator (LSS), acoustic and electromagnetic testing bays, multi-axis vibration tables and the ESA Propulsion Laboratory (EPL). Prior to the launch of almost all equipment that ESA launches is tested in some degree at ESTEC.
The Space Expo is ESTEC's visitors center. It has a permanent exhibition about space exploration.
Contents |
Activities
- Future mission assessment
- Current project support
- Test Center
- Operations
History
The European Space Research and Technology Centre was to be a facility at the very core of ESRO. Its responsibilities included the engineering and testing of satellites and their payloads, the integration of scientific instruments in these payloads, and making arrangements for their launch. In some cases member states were to produce the scientific instruments for ESRO or produce them as part of their own national effort and compensate ESTEC for its service. In practise, national organisations simply used ESTEC as a service organisation and left it to pay for their efforts from the ESRO budget. After the Bannier Report the facility gained overall executive authority for spacecraft development and was merged with ESLAB. The satellite control centre was also moved to ESOC. ESTEC was originally to be located in Delft (South Holland) but because of unforeseen difficulties, Noordwijk was chosen instead.
See also
External links
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: European Space Research and Technology Centre |
- European Space Research and Technology Centre
- (Dutch) Space Expo Noordwijk (ESTEC visitors center)
- ESTEC Test Centre Operations
.jpg){kind=small} |
This article related to the European Space Agency is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
 |
This space- or spaceflight-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
