European nations have agreed that there will be no fresh cash for ITER, the international fusion reactor project based in the south of France. Nature reported last week that with EU member states reluctant to hand over fresh funds to cover the spiralling costs of the reactor, ministers were instead planning on covering the €1.4-billion shortfall by drawing on the EU budget – principally from the funds for the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) for research, the main science-funding mechanism in Europe for 2007–13.

The proposal horrified senior scientists, who feared that it would sap a vital source of research funding for Europe’s scientists at a time when many national governments are cutting science budgets at home. Helga Nowotny, president of the European Research Council, which funds blue-skies research, called the move “a small catastrophie”. And the European Commission had objected to the plan, arguing that it ran counter to many of the EU’s avowed goals. The EU Research Commissioner Máire Geoghegan-Quinn attempted to prise a longer-term financial commitment to the project from EU member states – and of-course more cash (Europolitics).

It’s now clear that she failed. On 12 July, ministers finally waved through the proposal at a meeting of the European Council (BBC, Europolitics). The proposal, howver, still requires the approval of the European Parliament – which it may not get. Exactly how this “small catastrophie” will play out across Europe’s labs and universities remains unclear.