Russia will spend 1.5 billion rubles in 2020-2021 on the development of a technical design for the Yenisei super-heavy launch vehicle intended for flights to the Moon. The relevant materials are posted on the public procurement website, RIA Novosti reports.
As previously reported by sources in the rocket and space industry, Roscosmos is designing a super-heavy rocket Yenisei and its more lifting version of the Don. The first is capable of delivering a payload weighing at least 100 tons to low-earth orbit, and 27 tons to the Moon. “Don” will be able to deliver 140 tons and 33 tons of cargo, respectively.
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov said that the rocket development program ranges from one to 1.7 trillion rubles. This is how much the first rocket will cost, the cost of the next was not named.
Earlier in October, Dmitry Rogozin, the general director of Roskomos, said that the creation of the Russian super-heavy carrier Yenisei would be expensive, “under a trillion rubles.”
In August 2019, the manager announced that Yenisei would be four times cheaper than its American competitor, and with the first launch it would send an artificial satellite into polar lunar orbit.
Currently, only the United States has a ready-made super-heavy rocket (SpaceX's Falcon Heavy carrier). A second rocket of the same class (Boeing's SLS carrier) is due to fly in 2021.
