Threat of a Chinese Nuclear Incident on the Moon

Commentary

China, Russia, and the United States are planning to build nuclear power plants on the moon to ensure operations for their manned and unmanned lunar exploration programs.

But only China is building a manned moon landing vehicle that sheds a large propulsion stage, which then crashes into the moon.

According to a number of media reports, on July 31, Transportation Secretary and acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy issued a directive that the United States develop a 100-kilowatt nuclear power plant that would be ready to launch to the moon by 2030, about five years before China and Russia plan to land their lunar nuclear power plant.

During a news conference in early August, Duffy said: “We’re in a race to the moon, in a race with China to the moon. And to have a base on the moon, we need energy.”

Duffy’s new directive notes, “Since March 2024, China and Russia have announced on at least three occasions a joint effort to place a reactor on the Moon by the mid-2030s.”

On March 5, 2024, Russian state media TASS quoted Yury Borisov, former head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, as saying, “Today, we are seriously considering a project to deliver to the Moon and mount a power reactor there jointly with our Chinese partners somewhere between 2033 and 2035.”

Although China has not disclosed much detail about its lunar nuclear ambitions, an unofficial comment from December 2019 on the now-shuttered Chinese military affairs discussion forum CJDBY noted that Chinese development of space nuclear power started before 2015.

This brief report also noted that a 10-kilowatt power reactor might weigh 800 kilograms (about 1,764 pounds) and a 100-kilowatt reactor might weigh 2 1/2 metric tons (about 5,516 pounds)—the size of a reactor suitable for use on the moon.

The importance of being first with a nuclear power reactor on the moon is geostrategic, according to the U.S. directive, which states, “The first country to do so could potentially declare a keep-out zone which would significantly inhibit the United States from establishing a planned Artemis presence if not there first.”

This is important because China, Russia, and the United States—at least in the early phases of their moon base building—are all targeting a limited number of zones clustered around the moon’s south pole that have higher chances for yielding “water ice,” which could be used to produce oxygen and rocket fuels.

So the placement of nuclear power systems could become entwined with the race to secure the best real estate with resources to better sustain moon bases for many missions, such as securing cislunar space to ensure the success of Golden Dome missile defenses on Earth and providing a waypoint to Mars.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) promotes advancements in its space and moon program for domestic propaganda, with the declared intention of sending astronauts to the moon by 2030. However, it has not disclosed the inherent dangers associated with the design of its crewed moon landing vehicle, known as Lanyue, meaning “embracing the moon.”

The 26-metric-ton Lanyue consists of two stages, a likely 15-metric-ton to 16-metric-ton crewed moon landing cabin and a 10-metric-ton to 11-metric-ton propulsion module.

There is as yet no Chinese-disclosed name for the propulsion module, whereas the Lanyue and the new manned spaceship Mengzhou were subject to considerable state media publicity when their names were announced.

The propulsion module’s concept is derived from the design of the defunct Soviet-era L1 manned moon lander, which also used a large propulsion stage.

For Lanyue, the propulsion stage provides two functions: It sustains the Lanyue in a lunar orbit for some time before the manned Mengzhou docks with it to transfer crew, and it gives most of the thrust to decelerate the manned cabin to an altitude much closer to the lunar surface.

Dividing the fuel between the manned cabin and propulsion module allows for a lighter-weight manned cabin—approaching the 15-plus metric tons of the U.S. Apollo-era Lunar Excursion Module—meaning that it can use smaller and lighter-weight engines for its return to lunar orbit.

But when the propulsion module reaches its target lower altitude, this large piece of equipment, perhaps weighing about 3 metric tons to 4 metric tons less than its fuel, then detaches from the manned moon lander and crashes into the moon.

A 2023 Chinese space engineering journal article included a graph that indicated the propulsion stage might crash about 2,000 meters (about 6,562 feet) away from the manned lander cabin.

A logical next concern would be what distance China and Russia plan to put between their lunar nuclear power station and their moon landing zones, as an errant crashing propulsion module would pose a realistic threat.

Early Chinese images from 2020 suggested that the propulsion module might have its own thrusters, potentially allowing for a “controlled” crash that would be less threatening. However, the most recent Chinese images and revealed models of the Lanyue moon lander do not show the propulsion module having such thrusters.

Does this now indicate that China has no plans to provide the propulsion module with the ability to perform a guided, or even a precision, crash into the moon?

While an unguided crashing propulsion module causes one level of concern—given how the chances for conflict with communist China on Earth could immediately affect its behavior in space—a guided propulsion module could be used as a weapon against the moon bases of the United States and its space partners.

If China were at all interested in changing this picture, it certainly has the ability to design a larger moon lander that could dispense with a “bombing” propulsion module.

However, Chinese disclosures from 2020 about their moon exploration architecture clearly show that the Lanyue propulsion module will also be used to put a large manned moon rover and habitation cabin on the moon, meaning that it has long been planned for other large payloads.

This threat of crashing Chinese propulsion modules is certainly worthy of public mention by U.S. space officials as one means of prompting larger global concern to force China to respond.

This issue could also be raised in future meetings between U.S. and Chinese space officials that are not barred by the 2011 Wolf Amendment of former Republican Congressman Frank Wolf of Virginia, which forbids substantial cooperation with China in space out of espionage and human rights concerns.

The return of humans to the moon should be celebrated as a great achievement. But the Chinese regime must be put on notice that its potentially dangerous behavior, such as errant bombing of propulsion modules, could force the United States and its partners to require “defense” systems for its moon bases.

As China currently plans to start employing its Lanyue moon lander for manned missions in 2029 or 2030, there is time to request that the CCP provide demonstrable assurances that its propulsion module will not become a harbinger for conflict on the moon.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.