An artist’s conception shows a spaceship with a nuclear thermal propulsion system. (NASA illustration)
Seattle-based Ultra Safe Nuclear Technologies and its partners are among three teams that have won $ 5 million in contracts from NASA and the Department of Energy to develop reactor designs for space-based nuclear thermal propulsion systems.
USNC-Tech’s partners include parent company Ultra Safe Nuclear Corp. and the space company Blue Origin from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos – as well as General Electric Hitachi Nuclear Energy, General Electric Research, Framatome and Materion.
The team will be working on a concept known as the Power Adjusted Demonstration Mars Engine, or PADME, under the direction of the DOE’s Idaho National Laboratory.
Another order went to Virginia-based BWX Technologies for a reactor design that is being developed in collaboration with Lockheed Martin. General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems of San Diego received the third order and will work with X-energy and Aerojet Rocketdyne.
Battelle Energy Alliance, the executive and operational contractor for the Idaho National Lab, led the tender, evaluation and procurement with NASA sponsorship. The 12-month contracts require each of the teams to create a conceptual reactor design that could support future space missions.
At the end of the 12-month period, the INL will carry out design reviews of the reactor concepts and give recommendations to NASA. These recommendations, in turn, are expected to influence future technology design and development efforts by NASA.
“These design contracts are an important step towards tangible reactor hardware that could one day fuel new missions and exciting discoveries,” said Jim Reuter, assistant administrator of NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, in a press release.
Before: Nuclear power in space is approaching critical mass as the next limit to the last limit
Nuclear power represents one of the limits of space propulsion technology. Nuclear thermal propulsion systems use the heat from an on-board reactor to propel propellants, while nuclear electric propulsion systems generate electricity for an ion propulsion system. Such propulsion systems are considered to be more efficient than chemical missiles for missions beyond orbit.
Blue Origin has a separate 2.5 million program known as Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations, or DRACO.
NASA also plans to work with the DOE and INL to solicit commercial proposals for building a 10-kilowatt-class nuclear power plant that could be demonstrated on the lunar surface. This project could also lead to the development of nuclear electric propulsion systems in space.
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