Italy is leading efforts to study reentry systems for an ISS cargo module that can return items to earth rather than burn up in the atmosphere as the current ATV does: Italy Plays Lead Role In Launcher Initiatives - Aviation Week - July.8.10
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Orbital Sciences delays a launch to fix a software bug: Minotaur Launch Report | Better safe than sorry: Rocket software being fixed - Spaceflight Now - July.8.10.
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Alan Boyle reports on the Rocketplane liquidation announcement: Rocketplane runs out of gas - Cosmic Log - July.8.10.

A bit more info on the Dassault study of a 6 person suborbital space vehicle mentioned recently by Rob Coppinger the other day: VSH Spacecraft Study Nearly Done - Aviation Week.

BTW, Rob is leaving Flight Global for a news editor job at Incisive Media. I'll miss his reporting and frequent scoops on news in the space industry.

Via White Label Space comes this interesting report from a Swiss news station about the Swiss Propulsion Laboratory(SPL):

The UK is apparently going to reorganize its space efforts into a new space agency but it's not clear if more funding for space will be included:
/-- Will UK space agency announcement see £20 million for industry? - Hyperbola
/-- I got an invite! - Rocketeers.co.uk

An update on the space plane prototyping projects at the Italian Center for Aerospace Research (CIRA): Italian Space Plane Prototype to Attempt Daring Maneuvers - SPACE.com - Mar.1.10.

More links for the Italian space plane program are listed here.

Rob Coppinger provides an alternative point of view on the motivations for developing the Ariane 6: Ariane 6 won't replace Ariane 5 - Hyperbola.

Rob ends with this teaser:

However with a 2025 timeframe there is always the wild card. If testing goes well for the Reaction Engines' air breathing Sabre engine technologies in the next 18-months the late 2011 decision may be swayed to think of a two-stage to orbit NGL. Don't snigger, it has more fans within ESA than you would think.

Rob Coppinger reports on an examination of what it would take to launch the Orion capsule on an Ariane 5 : French govt study backs Orion Ariane 5 launch - Hyperbola.

Here's a typical sign of why the mainstream aerospace companies will never lead the way to greater spacefaring. One of the two top launch companies brags about how it successfully raised prices rather than about how raised its profitability by reducing its internal costs: Arianespace ’09 Revenue Boosted by Higher Launch Prices - Space News.

Such companies have essentially zero motivation to invest in new launch systems that would reduce launch costs and allow for lower prices for their customers. Since they see no price elasticity, lower priced launches would only lower their total revenues. It will require new competition from companies like SpaceX to bring about lower launch prices.

Jonathan Amos reports on the announcement of the formation of a space agency in the UK government: The UK's space agency and "mini-Augustine" report - BBC.

Rob Coppinger discusses the implications of such an agency: UK gets an executive space agency but what is that? - Hyperbola.

The announcement of the new space agency came as a review was released by the British National Space Centre Space Exploration Review - BNSC - Dec.10.09. It examined

options for future UK participation in the exploration of our solar system, especially locations where humans will one day live and work such as the Moon and Mars

See the review here: Economic Analysis to support a Study on the Options for UK Involvement in Space Exploration - BNSC - Mar.19.09 (pdf).

A second report that accompanied the review focused on various space economics issues: Economic Analysis to support a Study on the Options for UK Involvement in Space Exploration - BNSC/London Economics - Mar.19.09 (pdf).

Rob points to a section that discusses three RLV projects in the UK: UK studies reusable launch vehicle economics - Hyperbola.

The economics report also includes an analysis of space tourism and uses a very conservative estimate of demand versus ticket prices.

Rob Coppinger is reporting at twitter.com/flighthyperbola on the 1st EU-ESA International Conference on Human Space Exploration currently underway in Prague today.

An announcement from Bristol Spaceplanes describes the new paper, The Aviation Approach to Space Transportation (pdf), by David Ashford: Bristol Spaceplanes: Ashford paper; Ascender engine test video - Rocketeers.co.uk - Aug.30.09.

It also briefly discusses recent engine tests and gives a link to a video of a test.

Note that Andy Janes recently posted an interview here with Ashford.

ESA may purchase one Soyuz spacecraft per year starting in 2013 to send European astronauts to the ISS:
/-- Europe looks to buy Soyuz craft - BBC
/-- Europe wants to buy Russian Soyuz spacecraft: Europe has offered to buy a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to continue manned flights after the US retires the Shuttle in two years - Telegraph

(Links via spacetoday.net)

Rob Coppinger has posted an interview with representatives of Project Enterprise, which is developing a space tourism suborbital spaceplane: VIDEO: The long awaited Project Enterprise interview - Hyperbola.

Here is a translation of a press release from Project Enterprise from July 13 about an Swiss-Italian group's initial efforts at designing the interior of the vehicle.

A couple of reports from Jack Kennedy on European space transport development:
/-- ESAs Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV) Being Prepared for 2012 Test - Spaceports - Aug.23.09
/-- ESA Proceeds with Advanced Re-Entry to Evolve to Human Capsule for Space Access - Spaceports - Aug.23.09

Probably there will not be any increase in space program funding but it's still a big change in British policy: It's blast-off Britain as ban on space flight ends - Times Online (via spacetoday.net).

[Lord Drayson, the science minister,] said: “Britain should be playing a full role in space exploration. There was a special fund for training astronauts and we did not contribute, but that is now changed. There are important benefits that come from manned space-flight and we have dropped our opposition. We have an astronaut entering training soon and I hope he will be the first of many.”

Appears that the UK will get a space agency but there will be no boost in money for space: UK to get "space agency" but no new money - Hyperbola
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The ESA's awards a contract for the European eXPErimental Re-entry Test-bed (EXPERT) project, which involves the design and instrumentation of "a generic configuration for in-flight measurement of the effects of hypersonic flight at high altitudes": ESA awards 2010 EXPERT re-entry demonstrator vehicle contract - Hyperbola.

The UK may create a NASA type of organization: Will 22 July become UK space agency day? - Hyperbola.

Duncan Law-Green responds in A British NASA? - Rocketeers.co.uk.

As I think I've said before, I kind of have mixed feelings about this. In the sense that it shows an increased political priority for space policy, it's potentially a good thing, but I don't want to see another bloated bureaucratic monster like NASA. An agile, responsive agency working on key enabling technologies in the DARPA model would be better, I think.

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While Rob Coppinger notes that the UK space minister is enthusiastic about RLVs in this video interview, he reports that the ESA director of launchers says, "We will not have reusable launchers for another 40 years." : Has the countdown to Ariane 6 begun? - Flight Global.
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The latest on the ESA's Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) program: Europe's new space truck takes shape - BBC.

The European Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV) atmospheric reentry demonstrator, which has a small lifting body design, will fly to space on a Vega launcher in 2012: ESA and Thales Alenia Space establish agreement for development of Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV) - ESA - June.16.09.

Here is a video showing how the mission would proceed. Additional info here and the YouTube version below:

The latest on the Soyuz program in French Guiana and the Italian Vega launch vehicle project:
/-- Paris Air Show: Commercial Soyuz, Vega launchers face up to cost pressures - Flight Global - June.14.09
/-- Delays seen for Soyuz, Vega launches at Europe's space base - AFP - June.15.09

Rob Coppinger has a report on discussions going on in Europe over long term plans for the human spaceflight program: Paris Air Show: Europe looks beyond just science - Flight Global.

The first phase, extending from 2016 to 2020, would involve ISS utilisation and spacecraft development. Phase two, in the 2020s, envisages low Earth orbit infrastructures that would replace the ISS for the assembly of vehicles, crew exchange and docking operations. ESA thinks Mars sample return missions and low lunar orbit infrastructure are also possibilities. The third phase, in the late 2020s to early 2030s, would involve the lunar outpost. This work would contribute towards the fourth phase, a late 2030s manned Mars mission.

I'll note that an infrastructure in LEO like that would provide for the assembly of systems from small modules, which would allow for a move to first generation fully reusable vehicles to lower costs. However, instead, the emphasis is on building yet another large throwaway vehicle :

To enable space shipyards and low lunar orbit stations, industry proposed a 50,000kg (110,000lb) to low Earth orbit-capable Ariane-type rocket with six solid rocket boosters, instead of Ariane 5's two, and a twin Vinci engine upper stage. Today the most powerful Ariane 5, the ES ATV, which launches ESA's Automated Transfer Vehicle, can put 20,000kg into LEO.

Three launches of this Ariane X would orbit a lunar lander, its Earth departure stage (EDS) and a second EDS for a crewed spacecraft. The lander and its EDS would dock in Earth orbit and go to a low lunar orbit space station (LSS).