"We learned a lesson from the ISS, which was not that (international) cooperation was at fault, but that construction cannot depend on a single (type of) launch vehicle," ESA Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain told reporters.

"All partners involved in (future) big projects should think about this, to avoid the repercussions of a single breakdown."

Dordain was speaking ahead of a key meeting among ISS partners to discuss the future of the troubled outpost in orbit, and as Europe mulls its long-term plans in space, including whether to join a US project to send humans back to the Moon and then on to Mars.

The ISS construction programme has been plagued by problems with the US space shuttle, which is the only vehicle able to take up very large components.

The only other transport is Russia's Soyuz spacecraft, which can only carry a small human crew, and small, unmanned resupply ships.

The shuttle is due to be mothballed from 2010 and long delays between missions as a result of the February 2003 destruction of the shuttle Columbia have ripped big holes in the building schedule.

As a result, ESA and Japan, which are contributing modules and other components to the ISS, fear that the ISS may never be completed and that their work may never leave the ground.

In ESA's case, the Columbus science module, due to be delivered to NASA this year, has cost more than a billion euros (1.2 billion dollars).

Even if the units are installed, they may never be used fruitfully because the station, reduced to a skeleton crew, will lack personnel to carry out the experiments, scientists fear.

Dordain said that if NASA were able to carry out 18 ISS flights with its remaining three shuttles before the fleet is retired, "we are in a situation which enables us to be optimistic that Columbus will be launched and will be used."

Looking at ESA's plans for the future, Dordain said, "We have no hesitation about cooperating with the Americans... but just as we are a trustworthy partner, we are also not a blind partner."

ESA, he added, "has an interest in taking part in a space vehicle system driven by one of our partners, the United States or Russia."

NASA is looking at potential alternatives to the shuttle after 2010, while Russia is pitching its own version of the shuttle, Kliper.

Dordain said he was a fan of Kliper, but ESA ministers sidelined the project at a meeting in Berlin last month, where they adopted a five-year budget worth a total 8.255 billion euros (9.710 billion dollars).

ESA comprises 17 countries - 15 members of the European Union (EU) plus Switzerland and Norway.

It is to hold talks with the EU this year about setting a long-term strategy for Europe in space.

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