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by SiempreViernes 880 days ago
The funding status of big science collaborations is always a bit opaque, as there are a lot of individual actors with independent funding streams, and there's always a lot of R&D, the cost of which you can only guess in advance.

Formally ESA has moved the LISA project into a "implementation phase", meaning they intend to build it, but no money has been "pledged" as far as I know. However, LISA is a flagship Space Science programme, and the SSPs are part of the ESA budget all member states must contribute to.

Basically there's a fixed, overall budget that is then split for each project adopted. So there is definitely money but I'm not sure there is a public statement that "this particular pile of money belongs to LISA"