China seems to be gearing up to develop a defense system to prevent asteroid strikes, a senior space agency officially confirmed. The country is planning to step up its long-term space ambitions.

Zhang Kejian, head of the China National Space Administration, hinted at the new development in his opening remarks at a ceremony for China’s Space Day. However, he did not divulge much about the new defense system.

China boosts space exploration plans

In recent years, China has ramped up its space exploration plans intending to establish a program operating space flights and ferrying tons of cargo and passengers to space by 2045.

The European Space Agency (ESA), back in 2020 signed a 129 million euros deal to develop a spacecraft for a joint project with NASA. The main focus of the project is to examine how to deflect space rocks hurtling towards Earth at high speed.

The Chinese space agency is planning a mission where a space probe will land on a near-Earth asteroid to collect samples for examination. The probe will fly back to Earth to detach a capsule with samples and orbit another comet, reports Xinhua News Agency, citing Ye Peijian, an academic at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

China’s future roadmap

The mission could take around a decade to serve its purpose, ye added. Besides, Chinese and Russian space agencies have signed a memorandum of understanding to create an international lunar research station.

Moreover, China is said to launch its Tiangong-3 space station and will soon place its pieces into orbit. Soon after, China will also launch a new orbital observatory with Hubble Space Telescope-like imaging capabilities.

The Chinese Space Station Telescope (CSST) telescope will have the same resolution as the Hubble telescope but with a 300 times larger field of view. It will allow the telescope to survey 40 percent of the sky in 10 years.