The European Space Agency and Innovation minister Lord Drayson have agreed to build a robotics research station at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire.

The activities of the center will revolve around space robots and alternative power sources. One of its first projects will be ExoMars, a robotic probe whose destination will be to search for life on the Red Planet. It will also use space data to plot a model of climate change on Mars.

Several European ministers as well as one from Canada have concluded a conference of two days, and pledged a €10 billion budget and drawn up a strategy for the project.

The European GPS service Galileo keeps its funding as well as plans for ''exploitation and evolution of the International Space Station [and] on-board research in life and physical sciences.'' Funds have also been granted for a feasibility study on a returnable vehicle.

Peter Hinze, who leads the German delegation, told BBC that the money would certainly help Europe "leave the economic crisis and to gain new economic strength".

The budget actually surpasses what the ESA asked for.

The BBC quotes ESA director-general Jean-Jacques Dordain as saying ''It demonstrates that the member states, number one, believe in what space can do for the citizens; number two, they believe in ESA as a successful organization; and number three, that in a period of economic crisis, this is the right time to invest into the future.''

Some of the funds will also go to maintaining the costs of running the European spaceport in French Guiana.