Russia to start assembling new orbital station in 2028

The head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Bakanov, confirmed that the deployment of the first module of the Russian Orbital Station is scheduled for 2028. The head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Bakanov, spoke about this in an interview with TASS General Director Andrei Kondrashov.

The scientific and energy module, which will form the basis of the future station, was assembled at the end of last year. Now engineers are preparing it for electrical tests — a key stage of pre-launch testing. It was previously assumed that the launch would take place at the end of 2027, but the work schedule was adjusted taking into account the real pace of preparation.

The station is planned to be launched into a near-polar orbit. This choice of trajectory will open up unique opportunities for observing the Earth, in particular the northern regions of the country. The full cycle of ROS deployment is designed for the period from 2028 to 2033. At the first stage, until 2030, universal nodal, gateway and basic modules will be sent into orbit — they will form the core of the station. Then, from 2031 to 2033, two target modules will be added to the structure to expand scientific and applied tasks.

The total cost of the project is estimated at 608.9 billion rubles. Of this amount, about 150 billion rubles will be spent during the first three years of implementation. These funds will be used to complete development, ground testing and prepare the launch infrastructure.

As for the crew, the first ROS crew will be astronauts who will work at the International Space Station at the time the decision is made to switch to a national facility.