More of the nation's space operations are moving to Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque next year. The Battlespace Environment Division, with 175 jobs and an $89million annual budget is transfering from Hanscom Air Force Base in Massachusetts to Kirtland next year as part of the recommendations of the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission.

The division's missions include developing advanced surveillance technologies and studying conditions in space that can affect military operations. The division has Dept. of Defense wide responsibility to perform basic and applied research and development to provide technologies to warn operators of potential problems and to protect our space assets from the effects of the space environment.

The Battlespace Environment Division is one of three divisions that make up the Space Vehicles Directorate. The other two divisions are already at Kirtland. The Battlespace Environment Division includes the Space Weather Center of excellence and the Battlespace Surveillance Innovation Center. The Innovation Center develops detection and imaging technologies that can provide the military with information about combatant forces in the field. The Weather center studies phenomena in space that can affect military systems and develops ways to predict, mitigate and reduce those effects. These range from radio signal interference in the ionosphere to radiation damage to spacecraft hardware. The Environment Laboratory will develop technologies to improve space systems and operations.

The Air Force plans to break ground in January with a completion date of July 2010.