Nuclear Electric Propulsion Spacecraft
Electrically powered propulsion with a nuclear reactor was considered by dr.
Nuclear electric propulsion spacecraft. Earlier robert goddard had noted such a possibility in his personal notebook. A spacecraft using ntp could cut the travel time to mars by 20 or 25 percent compared. Congress has added funding to nasa appropriations bills to support development of the technology. Nuclear thermal propulsion has a number of advantages over current chemical and electric propulsion systems.
Via solar energy absorbed from the sun or via nuclear fission. The nuclear electric rocket terminology is slightly inconsistent as technically the rocket part of the. Rtgs convert the heat generated by the radioactive decay of plutonium into electricity. Nuclear electric propulsion that converts thermal energy to electricity to power plasma thrusters for highly efficient and rapid transport of large payloads e g a propulsion system with a power level of at least 1 mwe and a mass to power ratio kg kwe that is substantially lower than the current state of the art of nep systems.
The idea of using nuclear material for propulsion dates back to the beginning of the 20th century. Tony martin for interstellar project daedalus in 1973 but the novel approach was rejected because of very. A nuclear electric rocket more properly nuclear electric propulsion is a type of spacecraft propulsion system where thermal energy from a nuclear reactor is converted to electrical energy which is used to drive an ion thruster or other electrical spacecraft propulsion technology. The idea of electric propulsion for spacecraft dates back to 1911 introduced in a publication by konstantin tsiolkovsky.
Spear probe an ultra lightweight nuclear electric propulsion probe for deep space exploration. Game changing technology for deep space exploration. Both have been tested successfully though solar electric propulsion. An illustration of a spacecraft for deep space missions powered by nuclear thermal propulsion.
Nuclear propulsion includes a wide variety of propulsion methods that use some form of nuclear reaction as their primary power source.