The Canadian Space Agency (CSA) spent $1.16 billion in the 2025-26 fiscal year, the most it has ever spent and nearly twice the year before. Almost half of it went to the European Space Agency (ESA), notably to to support defence research and development.
The 2025-26 Departmental Results Report, posted Nov. 6, is the Canadian Space Agency’s annual report that outlines what it spent in its fiscal year, which, like those of all government departments, ends on March 31. Its annual plan called for $834 million in spending, and the agency ended up spending $326 million more.
The defence payment that made the difference
The CSA paid $562.9 million under its cooperation agreement with ESA, against the original $31.4 million it had planned. Most of the difference is $528.5 million the government announced in November 2025 as an early measure under the Defence Industrial Strategy. The report says the money reached the CSA as a transfer from the Department of National Defence (DND) to support defence research and development.
That money was part of Canada’s $664.6-million commitment at ESA’s ministerial council in Bremen, Germany, in late November 2025, which the report calls Canada’s “largest-ever commitment” to the agency. Canada takes part in ESA as a cooperating state, and ESA awards contracts to companies in each participating country roughly in proportion to what that country pays in. The CSA expects about 80 per cent of the money to come back to Canadian industry that way.
Canada’s industrial return coefficient, the value of ESA contracts won by Canadian organizations divided by what Canada has paid in, stood at 0.74 at the end of March, measured cumulatively since 2015-16. A coefficient of 1.0 would mean Canadian organizations had won back the full value of Canada’s contributions.
The CSA target is 0.93 by March 2030, just after the current agreement ends on Jan. 1, 2030. Access to ESA contracts depends on which ESA programs Canada subscribes to, and those subscriptions are set every three years. The CSA puts the low figure down to “the significant and sudden increase in funding” under the Defence Industrial Strategy and expects it to climb steadily toward 1.0 as Canadian organizations win ESA contracts.
Sixty-five Canadian organizations took part in ESA-funded projects during the year. Canadian companies also gained access to four ESA programs Canada had not funded before, which Ottawa authorized in March: Moonlight, a lunar communications and navigation service; FutureNAV, for next-generation satellite navigation; ACCESS, a commercialization program; and ERS-EO, Earth observation for security and resilience.
Canadarm3 work continued as NASA paused Gateway
The CSA kept building Canadarm3, the robotic arm Canada agreed to supply for the Lunar Gateway, NASA’s planned station in orbit around the Moon. In July 2025 it advanced the arm’s detailed design and completed the critical review of the Gateway External Robotic Interfaces, the fittings the arm would use on the station. NASA announced March 24 that it intended to pause Gateway and shift to the lunar surface. The CSA “intends to repurpose Canadarm3 investments to support the next phase of lunar exploration,” the report says.
Assets under construction on the CSA’s balance sheet rose by $259 million during the year, to $865.8 million at March 31, and the agency’s financial statements point to Canadarm3 as the main asset being built.
As of March 31, before the WildFireSat contract was terminated, the agency also had $770 million in contractual obligations for building assets over the four fiscal years to 2029-30, mostly for Canadarm3 and WildFireSat. SpaceQ’s tracking of federal Moon program contracts, checked against Government of Canada open data, puts the funding committed to Gateway and Canadarm3 at $1.68 billion since 2019.
In March, the CSA ended its Lunar Rover Mission, a small rover Canadensys Aerospace was building to fly on a Firefly lander in 2029, after its preliminary design was finished. The report says the robotic mobility know-how could be used on other missions and for commercialization. The agency’s larger Lunar Utility Vehicle, meant to haul cargo and help astronauts on the surface, moved ahead with $14.6 million in contracts to three Canadian companies in July 2025.
WildFireSat reset and a new RADARSAT satellite
The CSA terminated its WildFireSat contract with the supplier in April 2026, just after the year closed, following what the report calls a comprehensive review of the project and its fit with the government’s needs. The supplier was Spire Global Canada, whose contract was worth about $72 million. The report says the government is working with industry and stakeholders to keep developing the wildfire-monitoring mission.
The RADARSAT Constellation Mission, Canada’s three radar satellites, handled more than 500,000 imagery requests from federal users for maritime surveillance, disaster response and climate research. The government announced $47 million to build, test and launch an additional satellite for the constellation, most of it for parts to speed up delivery.
The CSA also extended operations of SCISAT, Canada’s longest-running satellite, which tracks the chemistry that controls ozone, to 2028-29. It archived and validated 25 years of data from MOPITT, a Canadian instrument on NASA’s Terra satellite that was switched off in April 2025 when the spacecraft ran short of power.
Fewer services built on space data than targeted
The CSA counted 91 services to Canadians that depend on space data, short of its target of 111 and the lowest figure in the three years the report covers.
The space sector itself employed 14,622 people in 2024 and added $3.8 billion to gross domestic product, both above the CSA’s targets.
An internal self-assessment of how well the CSA follows legislation and Treasury Board policy found potential compliance concerns in procurement and real property, including long-term contract planning and tracking of reinvestment in its buildings. The agency says it developed an action plan to be in place by September 2026; the report, released in November, gives no update on whether it is.
The agency ended its own operations at the David Florida Laboratory, Canada’s spacecraft test centre in Ottawa, and licensed it to MDA Space, which began offering testing services in fall 2025. The report calls the licence an interim measure while a longer-term strategy is worked out.
Planned spending falls by nearly half by 2028-29
The CSA plans to spend $913.9 million in 2026-27, falling to $475.9 million by 2028-29, as funding for Canadarm3 winds down and cuts from the government’s Comprehensive Expenditure Review take hold. Planned spending figures tend to change as new money is approved or programs change: the agency’s plan for 2025-26 called for $834 million, and it spent $1.16 billion. The report says it expects more money for Canadarm3 and WildFireSat in future years.
The CSA carried $243 million of unspent authority into future years, nearly all of it capital project money, which it describes as an inherent part of managing the space program. Its unspent capital was more than twice the year before.
Because the report covers the year to March 31, it still describes two astronaut flights as coming. Jeremy Hansen flew around the Moon on Artemis II in April, and Joshua Kutryk launched to the International Space Station on Crew-13 on Oct. 1.
Alex MacDonald, appointed CSA president on Nov. 4, takes over from acting president Jean-Claude Piedboeuf, who signed the year’s financial statements in August. MacDonald told an industry conference in May that the agency must “rapidly pivot away from our gateway activities” and focus on lunar surface robotics, close to the direction the report sets out for Canadarm3.