China and Russia have reached an agreement for the construction of a nuclear power plant on the moon.
A contract of cooperation inked by China and Russia states that the Russian reactor will power the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), which is jointly headed by China and Russia and is expected to be finished by 2036, reported Space.com.
The news was made shortly after Nasa unveiled a budget proposal for 2026 that would eliminate the agency’s orbital lunar outpost plans.
According to a 2024 interview with Yury Borisov, director general of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, on the Russian state-owned news site TASS, the Chinese-Russian reactor’s construction will probably be completed autonomously “without the presence of humans.” Although it’s still unclear exactly how this may be accomplished, Borisov stated that the technology steps are “almost ready.”
“The station will conduct fundamental space research and test technology for long-term uncrewed operations of the ILRS, with the prospect of a human being’s presence on the Moon,” Roscosmos stated in a notice released on May 8 after the memorandum was signed.
Egypt, Pakistan, Venezuela, Thailand, and South Africa are among the 17 nations that have joined the initiative thus far. The new research station is a permanent, manned lunar colony situated on the moon’s south pole. China’s 2028 Chang’e-8 mission, the country’s first to land a man on the moon, will lay the foundation for it.
China and Russia said in June 2021 that they will use five super heavy-lift rocket launches between 2030 and 2035 to loft the components for a robotic moon base as part of the ILRS programme.
