China has continuing plans for expanding their presence in spacial activities. This article covers some detail of what they are doing, and plan to do.
by Morris Jones
Sydney, Australia (SPX) Mar 03, 2014
In 2015, China is expected to launch its next space laboratory. Tiangong 2 will follow on from the Tiangong 1 module, which was launched in 2011 and is still in orbit at the time of writing. Tiangong 1 received two crews of astronauts and carried out China's first space dockings. It is a small, roughly cylindrical module with a crew cabin and a service module featuring solar panels. Although Tiangong 1 is officially designated as a "space laboratory", it is really a small space station.
The launch of Tiangong 2 has been expected for a long time, but space analysts are puzzled by the nature of this spacecraft. Originally, China planned to launch three Tiangong modules, and Tiangong 2 was expected to be a marginally improved version of the Tiangong 1 spacecraft. Later, China seemed to drop plans for three Tiangongs and launch just two. We wondered how this would affect the design of the next module to be launched. A whirlwind of rumours, speculation and conflicting reports circulated. China seemed determined to allow the confusion to flourish.
Recent snippets of information from China have helped to clear up some of the confusion, but have still not given us a totally clear picture of the next Tiangong.
China has essentially confirmed plans that a cargo spacecraft will dock with Tiangong 2. This is consistent with the long-term goal of the Tiangong program: To verify the hardware and technology required to build a large space station.
More: http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/The_Next_Tiangong_999.html