NASA is looking forward to launch a mission to Jupiter's Icy Moon Europa by 2025, officials announced on Tuesday. Support of $15 million has been announced in the White House's 2015 federal budget to develop the mission to Europa. NASA officials said that Europa has a potentially life-supporting ocean of liquid water beneath its icy shell.

"Europa is a very challenging mission operating in a really high radiation environment, and there's a lot to do to prepare for it. We are looking for a launch sometime in the mid-2020s", NASA chief financial officer Beth Robinson told reporters Tuesday.

Robinson said although $15 million is a small amount for the mission's cost of $17.5 billion, but it will help in early pre-formulation work for a potential Europa mission.

She added that people want to know the total size of the possible mission, but it can't be said now for a simple reason that they are not sure about it at this point. But nevertheless, the agency officials will soon get in touch with the scientific community to map out the mission.

In all, Congress has allocated the space agency a total of $155 million over the last two years. Robinson and other NASA officials have suggested that the Europa mission space is wide open at this point of time, but the Europa Clipper is a concept that is most likely to be the candidate for the mission slated to be launched in 2025.

NASA researchers have been working on the Europa Clipper idea for years. The mission will send a spacecraft into the orbit of Jupiter and make dozens of flybys of Europa. It will make use of a variety of science instruments to gain insight into the moon's ice shell and subsurface ocean.

As per estimate of agency officials, about $2 billion will be spent to get the Europa Clipper off the ground.