This specific program, “The Artemis Program,” encompasses NASA's overview for lunar exploration plans. ![]() NASA is ready to announce plans to bring together Commercial Human Lander Awards for Artemis Missions on the Moon. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration of United States ( NASA) requested an increase in the 2020 budget of $1.6 billion in order to make another crewed mission around the Moon in 2024, followed by a sustained presence on the Moon by 2028. The United States has run several attempts to design and in some cases develop lunar outposts and the needed missions, the first being from 1959, with the upcoming Artemis missions being the most advanced. Main article: NASA lunar outpost concepts On March 9, 2021, Russia and China signed a memorandum of understanding for the joint construction of the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) around 2035. CNSA director Luan Enjie has stated that humans must learn to leave Earth and "set up a self-sufficient extraterrestrial homeland". The China National Space Administration ( CNSA) has commenced the Chang'e program for exploring the Moon to investigate the prospect of lunar mining, specifically for mining isotope helium-3 for use as an energy source on Earth. There is a projected timeline stretching from the 2030s to 2045. Roscosmos signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in the creation of the ILRS with CNSA on March 9, 2021. Long-term robotic and short-term crew missions at the ILRS are expected to begin in the early 2030s. The first steps toward establishing the ILRS will be taken through Phase IV of the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program, consisting of Chang'e 6, 7, and 8, as well as the Russian missions, Luna 25, 26, and 27. In 2020, China proposed the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), a somewhat similar proposal to the Moon Village, with Roscosmos and ESA showing interest. Main article: International Lunar Research Station Interestingly the cooperative concept of the workshop led to a number of new themes, such as multipurpose mobile infrastructure, an astro-scientist training campus on the Moon, an experimental research food lab up to a lunar recycling facility. 35 master students have developed hypothetical scenarios for a future Moon village. In 2018, the Vienna University of Technology got sponsorship from ESA for a design workshop on the topic of the Moon Village. It is a non-profit organization, registered in Vienna, with the mission to create a global forum for the development of the Moon Village, and to potentially implement a permanent human settlement near the lunar south pole, taking advantage of near-continuous sunlight and nearby deposits of ice and other useful volatiles. Instead, the concept is being organized, loosely, by a nonprofit organization established in November 2017 called the Moon Village Association. ![]() While Woerner is the most famous advocate for Moon Village, it is not an ESA program. The State Space Agency of Ukraine has agreed to uphold MVA principles and cooperate with the MVA to develop "sustainable habitation" of the Moon. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin has long urged his fellow Americans to cooperate with international partners to reach the Moon. The private aerospace company Blue Origin has also expressed early interest and offered to develop a cargo lander with a 4,500 kg (9,900 lb) capacity of usable payload. Ĭhina has expressed interest, and NASA has also expressed interest in the potential synergy it offers to the proposed Lunar Gateway. ![]() The Director General of ESA, Jan Wörner, states that this vision of synergy can be as inspiring as the International Space Station but on a truly global, international-cooperation basis, and he proposes this approach as a replacement for the orbiting International Space Station, which is due to be decommissioned in 2024. This initiative is meant as the first step in coming together as a species and developing the partnerships and "know how" before attempting to do the same on Mars. Jan Wörner, ESA Director General until 2021, described in 2017 the Village simply as "an understanding, not a single facility". The idea is to achieve at least some degree of coordination and exploitation of potential synergies and to create a permanent sustainable presence on the surface of the Moon, whether robotic or crewed. The open nature of the concept would encompass any kind of lunar activities, whether robotic or astronauts, 3D printed habitats, refueling stations, relay orbiters, astronomy, exploiting resources, or even tourism.
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