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HISTORY OF EUMETSAT, p45.

HISTORY OF EUMETSAT, p43.

p44

on the modalities of systems matching the objectives of EUMETSAT".

This addition does not report the full content of Art.5.2 (a) v, which is:

"to decide on the modalities for embarking on the execution of systems other than that defined in Annex 1 and matching the objectives of EUMETSAT".

Nevertheless, as presented in the new Resolution, the addition could be interpreted as acknowledging that ADC was a new programme.

The Resolution included a new scale of contribution, allowing France to pay on the basis of GNP, whilst all other countries paid according to the scale for the MOP. Thus France established two points of principle: it protected its interpretation of the Convention; and made clear that it was serious about the GNP scale of contribution for new programmes.

The eleventh Council meeting adopted the Resolution in December 1989. Meteosat-3 was moved in orbit to 50° West by August 1991 under the ADC mission and in February 1993 was moved further to 75° West as a joint ESA/EUMETSAT project known as extended-ADC (X-ADC).

The legal arabesques performed to include ADC as an element of the MOP made it clear that EUMETSAT's Convention needed revision. The experience showed that if unanimity was required for all new programmes there was the potential for one Member State to prevent the others adopting major new programmes. It also emerged that because the Convention itself made reference to the Annex, any change to the content of the description of the MOP in the Annex constituted a change to the Convention and triggered the need for parliamentary approval in some Member States.

The evaluation of the Convention, which followed these experiences, began in a quiet fashion at the eleventh Council meeting in December 1989 with the introduction under "Any Other Business" of a document, based on a French proposal, "On the operation of EUMETSAT and a proposal for modification of its Convention".

The French argument was that although the Convention clearly envisaged that there would be more than one system of meteorological satellites, it made explicit provision only for the MOP. Yet EUMETSAT was seriously considering three major new programmes - Meteosat Transition Programme, Meteosat Second Generation and the EUMETSAT Polar System. These three programmes would involve National Meteorological Services in expenditure far greater than was usual for them. The programmes, therefore, needed to meet operational requirements and to be well managed if they were to retain the support of their paymasters. A number of additional points were made. EUMETSAT needed efficient decision-making processes if it wanted to influence ESA to take account of operational meteorology when establishing Earth observation programmes. At the time, EUMETSAT was struggling to persuade the Agency to take operational meteorology into account for its proposed polar orbiting missions (see chapter 7).

The concept of optional programmes was also recommended. These would make it possible for groups of Member States to go ahead with a project and negotiate their level of contribution.

SEE ALSO| |

1. Meteorologists shed political shackles, a review of Declan Murphy's history of the first 25 years of EUMETSAT (2011), by Helen Gavaghan.

2. An interview in 2010 with Dr Tillman Mohr, a special advisor to the secretary general of the World Meteorological Organisation, in Science, People & Politics.

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Contents

Preface

Foreword

Introduction

Ch.1

Ch.2

Ch.3

Ch.4

Ch.5

Ch.6

Ch.7

Ch.8

The History of EUMETSAT is available in English and French from EUMETSAT©.
First printed 2001. ISBN 92-9110-040-4

Eumetsat meteorology meteorological artificial satellites
European Space Agency weather climate policy politics history