China and Russia Announce their Future Plans for the Moon, Including a Human Base - Universe Today

However, amid all the excitement of this approaching moment in history are concerns about the lack of an international framework that will ensure our efforts are for the sake of “for all humankind.” Whereas NASA is seeking partners for its Artemis Program through bilateral agreements, Russia and China are pursuing an agreement of their own.

They call it the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), and they too are looking for partners in this endeavor.

The detailed plan for the ILRS was made public with the release of the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) Guide for Partnership, a document prepared by the China National Space Agency (CNSA) on June 16th, 2021.

According to the Guide, the ILRS represents a merger of Russia and China’s plans for lunar exploration, something that has been in the works for many years.

“Considering the fruitful experience from the People’s Republic of China and the Russian Federation in the areas of space technology, space science and space application, China National Space Administration (CNSA) and the State Space Corporation “Roscosmos” (ROSCOSMOS) jointly initiated the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) based on their [respective] existing lunar exploration plan.

In this respect, the Guide constitutes the official reply of China and Russia to the Artemis Accords, the series of bilateral agreements designed to establish common principles for lunar exploration.

The Accords are grounded in the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, the historic charter that established that “the exploration and use of outer space shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries and shall be the province of all mankind.”.

On March 3rd, 2021, Russian and China made it clear they intended to follow when they announced that they would be partnering to create an ILRS, which they described as “a comprehensive scientific experiment base with the capability of long-term autonomous operation, built on the lunar surface and/or on the lunar orbit.” With the release of the Guide, Russia and China have made the details of their plan public for the first time.

Similar to the Artemis Program, the ILRS calls for the creation of multiple facilities to enable long-term missions to the lunar surface.

Last, there is the Artemis Base Camp that will support the long-term exploration of the surface.

The second is the Support Facility on a lunar surface (similar to the Artemis Base Camp) that will include a command center, a global Telemetry, Tracking, and Command (TT&C) network, an energy supply system, a thermal management system, and various support modules.

This will include transporting cargo to other facilities, conducting exploration missions on the surface, or missions to explore the interior of stable lava tubes.

The fourth is the Lunar Scientific Facility, which will support lunar science operations on the surface, in-orbit, or in deep space.

It will also serve as a data center for lunar and deep-space missions, which China and Russia previously agreed to establish as part of their joint lunar efforts.

Once the ILRS is complete, China and Russia hope to maintain and expand it as needed.

Those missions are to conform to the objectives of each phase in question, with possible roles ranging from assisting with exploration to the construction of necessary infrastructure in orbit and on the surface, and the creation of base facilities.

Any Partner willing to contribute to the ILRS, through a jointly coordinated negotiation with China and Russia, can participate including co-lead status in any part of the project.

For Category A: Space Mission Cooperation, partners are asked to contribute to the “development of the general architecture, scientific objectives, road-map of ILRS, and participate with scientific or engineering missions of ILRS.”.

Space System Cooperation, must cooperate with China and/or Russia on one or more space systems based on the general architecture and functions of the ILRS.

As noted, the language used in the preface is indicative of the Outer Space Treaty, especially where it states that the overall aim is “the peaceful exploration and use of the Moon in the interests of all humankind.”.

However, as many critics have stated, the Artemis Accords suffer from the fact that they are tied to a specific space agency and program

In short, they have decided to establish a set of bilateral agreements that would allow others to participate in their program of lunar exploration