New Mars Forums

RobertDyck,

How long do you think we will be able to use nuclear electric propulsion to transport humans to the moon, Mars, and other areas within the inner solar system?

Maybe I'm getting a little forgetful.  I thought I saw somewhere (either here or Nuclearspace.com) that the two Martian rovers would be powered by "16 nuclear pellets"?  ???   

I just read an article over at ABCNEWS.com
http://abcnews.go.com/wire/SciTech/reut … 26_87.html that's states they will run on solar power.  Could someone verify this information?  Thanks.

P.S.  If they did run by an energy source other than solar (Nuclear power perhaps      ) NASA wouldn't worry about running a mission just during the Martian summer!

Does anybody know anything about the Liberty Ship?

There is an excellent article over at www.nuclearspace.com by Anthony Tate about the advantages of nuclear power use in space.  In particular, the GCNR.   I haven't seen anything about the Liberty Ship but it looks amazing.  I'll have to do some searching and see what I can find. 

USA Today has on it's weekend edition (7-9 Feb03) cover, orbital space plane on it's front page.  The article also mentions that NASA needs a more broader Apollo-like mission.

This is very good read for people for nuclear power in space!

http://www.spacedaily.com/news/nuclearspace-03e.html

I don't want to upset anyone and be accused of being narrow-minded but, since we know that nuclear engines can be made and have been tested before, why not focus on developing that technology first?  From what I've gathered, VASMIR is still a more efficient propulsion but we seem to have a problem with containing the plasma. 

I feel that once we get the ball rolling on nuclear propulsion, the technology will develop naturally until we get to VASMIR type propulsion systems.

Josh,

Why do you say that "China has it's eyes set on the moon (and for good reason)"?

This is what was said:  In his State of the Union Address, President Bush announced a $1.2 billion Freedom Fuel initiative to reverse America?s growing dependence on foreign oil by developing the technology needed for commercially viable hydrogen-powered fuel cells ? a way to power cars, trucks, homes and businesses that produces no pollution and no greenhouse gases. The Freedom Fuel initiative will include $720 million in new funding over the next five years to develop the technologies and infrastructure needed to produce, store, and distribute hydrogen fuel for use in fuel cell vehicles and electricity generation.

This was pretty interesting.  Imagine a car that produces water instead of carbon monoxide? 

GOM: I haven't heard anyone else comment on that point.

I haven't heard much about it either which I assumed.  Makes me wonder if the same would have happened if he did mention Prometheus.

I think that everybody that post here needs to do this.  What's it going to hurt?

Outstanding!!!  Now, everyone needs to keep their fingers crossed!     We may have nuclear powered spacecraft within our lifetimes and missions to Mars and the solar system!

Maybe "overwhelm" was the wrong word to use.     But, I still feel that we should continue to write to our politicians and express our ideas to them.  (Whether they actually listen is another story!)  I understand that we should not say that it must be a nuclear propelled spacecraft to get us to Mars but it will greatly help any mission that may occur.