The Norwegian government plans to invest almost NOK 650 million (almost €60 million) to build a second orbital launch pad at Andøya Spaceport. The state will own the pad and lease it to Andøya Space, the commercial operator of the orbital launch facility.
Norway’s Minister of Trade and Industry, Cecilie Myrseth, announced the planned investment during a 30 September event hosted by Norway’s Directorate for Space Activities. Christian Hauglie-Hanssen, Director General of the Norwegian Space Agency, later said the government would allocate an initial NOK 323.3 million for the new pad in its 2027 budget proposal. The remainder of the planned amount will then be included in the government’s 2028 budget.
According to Norway’s national news agency NTB, responsibility for building the new pad will be given to Forsvarsbygg, the Norwegian Defence Estates Agency. Once built, the pad will be leased to Andøya Space, a commercial entity in which the state holds a 90% stake. Additionally, the Norwegian Armed Forces will be tasked with securing the area around the spaceport, similar to the role played by the French military at the Guiana Space Centre.
The plan outlined by Minster Myrseth appears to mark a shift from the government’s initial approach to building out a second launch pad. In a proposal published earlier this year, the government said Andøya Spaceport’s business model envisaged two launch pads, with construction of the second dependent on Andøya Space securing a long-term contract with another launch provider. Under the new arrangement, the Norwegian state will instead bear the cost and retain ownership of the infrastructure.
More details on how the project will be financed, including where the funding will be drawn from, are expected when the government publishes its 2027 state budget on 7 October.
Andøya’s first launch pad is reserved for German launch startup Isar Aerospace under a long-term agreement. Isar conducted the first successful flight of its Spectrum rocket from the site on 5 September 2026. As part of the mission, the rocket deployed several small payloads, including FramSat-1, a student-built CubeSat from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology that became the first Norwegian satellite launched from Norwegian soil.
