The European Astronaut Centre is expanding

The European Space Agency (ESA) has signed a Letter of Intent (LoI) with the state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the German Aerospace Center - the Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V. (DLR) - defining the next steps for the construction of a new building in Cologne, Germany.

The European Astronaut Centre (EAC), home of the European Astronaut Corps and embedded within the local DLR campus infrastructure, is currently at full capacity. In order to accommodate more people onsite, a new building will be built next to the existing one, thus offering new offices to the workforce of ESA’s Directorate of Human and Robotic Exploration.

The new facility, expected to be delivered by the end of 2028, will benefit from a total budget of 20 million euros with the costs being equally shared between ESA and NRW. This building will allow ESA to relocate part of the workforce of the directorate from the Netherlands to Germany, turning Cologne into the new home of European space exploration.

“This new building is an important step in the evolution of our directorate. We will almost triple the number of people on site, and the European Astronaut Centre will become our main hub for ESA’s exploration activities,” said Daniel Neuenschwander, Director of Human and Robotic Exploration at ESA.

“Today, North Rhine-Westphalia demonstrates what our region stands for: courage, technological sovereignty and a clear desire to shape the future. By relocating this ESA directorate to Cologne, we are not only creating highly skilled jobs – we are firmly anchoring NRW at the heart of European spaceflight and giving research and industry the momentum they need for the next major steps in exploration,” said Mona Neubaur, Ministry of Economic Affairs, Industry, Climate Action and Energy of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia.

“With the relocation of the relevant ESA directorate to Cologne, astronautical space travel and exploration will have a new joint home in Germany. This will further strengthen European expertise in human and robotic exploration and improve the conditions for future ESA missions, training programmes and international cooperation – an important sign shortly before the ESA Ministerial Council meeting, which will take place in Bremen next week,” said Walther Pelzer, Director General of DLR. 

“The DLR site in Cologne is an integral part of North Rhine-Westphalia’s aerospace landscape. The planned investments will further advance the development of Space Hub Cologne. This will also strengthen DLR’s research and development work in the fields of aerospace medicine and exploration,” said Klaus Hamacher, Deputy Chairman of the DLR Executive Board.

The signature between the three partners took place in LUNA facility, a building co-owned by ESA and DLR, and a symbol of the synergies between the European and German space agencies.

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The European Space Agency (ESA) provides Europe’s gateway to space.

ESA is an intergovernmental organisation, created in 1975, with the mission to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space delivers benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.

ESA has 23 Member States: Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Latvia, Lithuania and Slovakia are Associate Members.

ESA has established formal cooperation with four Member States of the EU. Canada takes part in some ESA programmes under a Cooperation Agreement.

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