The world’s major powers want to establish a permanent human settlement on the Moon and secure the energy needed for space research. To that end, three superpowers, the United States, China and Russia, have entered an intense race to install nuclear reactors on the lunar surface.
The US space agency NASA has set a target of sending a nuclear reactor to the Moon by 2030 to provide uninterrupted power for future space missions. Moscow and Beijing, meanwhile, are moving ahead with a plan to jointly install a nuclear reactor named Selena on the Moon by 2036, the US newspaper The New York Times reported.
The report said it is extremely difficult to carry out long-term research on the Moon using solar power, because night there lasts for more than two weeks at a stretch. During that long period of darkness and extreme cold, there is no alternative to nuclear power for keeping a permanent base supplied with electricity and warmth. NASA wants to install its proposed 20-kilowatt Lunar Reactor-1 at the Moon’s south pole, where it would stay active for five years without any maintenance.
The 10-kilowatt Selena reactor of the China-Russia joint venture, by contrast, would be able to supply power automatically for a decade. Scientists, however, have expressed deep concern about the rush to put nuclear reactors on the Moon.
There is a major risk of radioactivity spreading in space or in the Earth’s atmosphere if an accident occurs during a rocket launch. It is also difficult to guarantee the safety of such reactors in an environment as hostile as the Moon’s. Fears have arisen, too, of new geopolitical conflict over lunar territory around nuclear installations.
Under the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, no country can claim sole ownership of any part of the Moon. But if a country declares a “restricted or protected zone” around its own reactor on the grounds of nuclear safety, the movement of other countries’ astronauts could be obstructed. Fearing this, the United States is pressing to carry out its project even faster, and divisions are now emerging in space as well.
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