China wants to start work on a moon base made out of lunar soil bricks created by robot ‘Super Masons’ within five years, state media claims
- Beijing ‘aims to establish a basic model for a lunar research station base’ by 2028
China plans to start building a lunar base using soil from the moon’s surface in just five years, the country’s media has reported.
By 2028, Beijing ‘aims to establish a basic model for a lunar research station base’, state news outlet CGTN reports, before expanding it into an international station.
It comes following a meeting of more than 100 scientists, researchers and space contractors at a conference in Wuhan, where they discussed ways to build infrastructure on the moon.
Ding Lieyun, an expert from the Chinese Academy of Engineering, said a team is designing a robot named ‘Chinese Super Masons’ to make bricks out of lunar soil, Chinese media reports.
Ding’s team previously proposed an egg-shaped base which could be constructed from the soil bricks, named the Lunar Pot Vessel, which could be created using 3D printers and lasers and house astronauts.
Ding’s team previously proposed an egg-shaped base which could be constructed from the soil bricks, named the Lunar Pot Vessel (pictured)
‘Building a habitat on the moon is needed for long-term lunar explorations, and will certainly be realised in the future,’ Ding said, while also acknowledging the difficulty of achieving it in the short term.
The robot tasked with making the ‘lunar soil brick’ will be launched during China’s Chang’e-8 mission around 2028, Ding said.
China is also reportedly aiming to retrieve the world’s first soil sample from the far side of the moon during a mission which could take place as early as 2025.
The super power previously retrieved soil samples from the near side of the moon with its Chang’e-5 mission in 2020, state media reported.
The country has stated that it wants its astronauts to stay on the moon for long periods once it establishes a lunar research station.
Ding and dozens of experts were attending the Extraterrestrial Construction Conference held at Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan last weekend.
The development in China’s extraterrestrial ambitions comes amid growing tensions between the communist state and the US, with the two superpowers engaged in an ongoing tussle for dominance in space.
In January, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson told in an interview of increasing concerns in the scientific agency over what the country plans to do when they make it to the moon.
‘There is potentially mischief China can do on the moon,’ said one other official monitoring the ‘space race’
NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said earlier this year that he and others within the agency are growing increasingly concerned over what China plans to do when they make it to the moon
Nelson believes China could attempt to corner the market on resource-rich locations on the moon’s surface and try to block out the US and other countries looking to make it to the lunar object.
‘There is potentially mischief China can do on the moon,’ said another official monitoring the ‘space race.’
‘It is a fact: we’re in a space race,’ said the NASA administrator who was appointed by President Biden in 2021.
‘And it is true that we better watch out that they don’t get to a place on the moon under the guise of scientific research. And it is not beyond the realm of possibility that they say, “Keep out, we’re here, this is our territory.”‘
NASA aims to put astronauts back on the lunar surface by around 2025.
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