The Japanese company plans to begin colonizing the moon by 2022.
When Neil Armstrong stepped onto the lunar surface, he imagined a dark, cold, inhospitable wasteland, where one technical failure could mean instant death. The Nixon administration even had a special speech prepared in case the astronauts faced a terrible fate hundreds of thousands of miles from home. Today, almost 50 years later, humanity is preparing to return to the Moon in order to preserve life on Earth. At least that's how the Japanese company ispace sees it.
Ispace Corporation dreams of "a world in which the Earth and the Moon are united into one ecosystem." Its representatives also argue that without the resources of the satellite it is impossible to support life on the Blue Planet.
“Using the lunar water resources, we will be able to develop the space infrastructure needed to improve daily life on Earth, as well as expand our range further into space. By combining the Earth and the Moon into one system, the new economy with space infrastructure will at its core support human life, making vitality a reality. This is our main goal, and finding water on the moon is the first step to achieving it."
ispace is planning a series of privately funded missions to the Moon, including orbiters and lander, to help prepare for the arrival of rovers exploring the Moon for water reserves and to potentially host a "lunar industrial platform" for a multipurpose human colony on the Moon.
The core of this colony will be 8.3-pound ispace carbon fiber rovers that can be loaded with tools provided by other companies to perform a variety of tasks, including collecting material and examining the lunar surface for resources.
So far, ispace has raised $ 90 million in its first round of funding and plans to launch the first mission to the moon in 2019. If the company goes on schedule, then in 2022 we will see the beginnings of a lunar colony.
Vladimir Mirny
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