Russia's Roscosmos and the China National Space Administration will present a declaration regarding a future International Lunar Research Station at the International Astronautical Congress in Dubai, Roscosmos said in a news release on Monday.
Roscosmos and CNSA representatives, together with experts from France, Italy, the Netherlands, Germany, Malaysia, Thailand and the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs held talks on a draft declaration on Monday. The consultations took place behind closed doors.
"After being reworked in accordance with the international experts' proposals the declaration will be presented to the world space community for wide discussion at the 72nd International Astronautical Congress, due in Dubai on October 25-29, 2021," the news release runs.
Roscosmos said the declaration would build up from the memorandum of understanding between the governments of Russia and China on the issue of creating a lunar station. The declaration will "outline common approaches to implementing the ILRS, such as patterns for participation by all partners concerned and the fundamental cooperation principles for the parties to the project to abide by."
Roscosmos and the CNSA at the global conference on space exploration GLEX-2021 in June presented an ILRS road map. According to the proposed concept, the lunar station is to be finalized by 2035. In 2026-2030, two missions are to be carried out to practice and test landing and cargo delivery techniques and also the transportation of lunar soil samples to the Earth. In 2031-2035, the participating parties will deploy infrastructure, such as communication systems and also power supply, research and other equipment in the Moon's orbit and on its surface.
As follows from the project's roadmap, the station's transport infrastructure will incorporate research and service Moon rovers and a jumping robot. The participants are going to equip the station with several smart minirovers for exploring the Moon's surface.
