KUBINKA, Moscow region. Aug 14 (Interfax) - The Keldysh Research Center, part of Russia's Roscosmos space corporation, is exploring key technologies needed for building a nuclear-powered space tug, Keldysh Center General Director Vladimir Koshlakov told Interfax.
"Experimental work is underway to explore key technologies which are the basis for this space system's construction," Koshlakov said.
This work is being done as part of the space tug pilot project, he said.
"Based on initial tests, the spacecraft should be ready by the end of the current decade," Koshlakov said.
Roscosmos CEO Yury Borisov said on April 26 that a future nuclear-powered space tug called Zeus could be used in a Russian-Chinese lunar program to deliver large cargoes to the Moon.
As reported earlier, Russia is developing a nuclear space propulsion system with a capacity of up to one megawatt as part of a project dubbed Zeus. Roscosmos Executive Director for Science and Long-Term Programs Alexander Bloshenko said on May 22, 2021, that the first Zeus prototype would be ready by 2030.
Koshlakov said on April 5 that a nuclear-powered space tug would be capable of operating in space continuously for up to ten years.
Nuclear power has been used in space projects before. The Soviet Union launched 32 spacecraft powered by radioisotope thermoelectric generators between 1970 and 1988. It also developed a nuclear-powered rocket engine and tested it at the Semipalatinsk test range in the 1960s-1980s.