South Florida Sun-Sentinel Palm Beach (Sunday)
SPACE COAST Nuclear-powered spacecraft to be built
Lockheed Martin awarded contract for ‘cold reactor’
Lockheed Martin was awarded a contract by federal agency DARPA in partnership with NASA to build out an experimental nuclear-powered spacecraft headed for a Space Coast launch that aims to make trips to the moon and Mars more efficient.
Its launch will be managed by the Space Force aiming for liftoff no later than 2027 working with either SpaceX or United Launch Alliance flying from either Cape Canaveral Space Force Station or Kennedy Space Center.
While it will have a nuclear reactor on board, officials say it won’t be turned on until it’s safe in orbit.
“We call it a cold reactor,” said NASA’s Anthony Calomino, the agency’s space nuclear technologies portfolio manager. “So that reactor will have not gone through a fission event. We will have not actually brought it up to criticality before launch.”
The means even with an accident on the launch pad or on its flight up to space, the source material — Uranium 239.— is just basically a metal, he said.
“It is safe to work around. It is safe to be around. It doesn’t need the protection measures that need to be in place for plutonium,” he said.
The contract announced Wednesday gives aerospace giant Lockheed the go ahead under the program DRACO (Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations), under which it will build out an X-NTRV (Experimental Nuclear Thermal Rocket Vehicle). The price tag for the final phases of the program comes to $499 million split between NASA and DARPA, with milestone-based payouts to Lockheed and its partners.
DARPA, which stands for Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, is the Department of Defense arm that looks to build out new technologies for the U.S. military. It partnered with NASA in January as both seek a cheaper, and in some ways safer, way to move long distances in space.
“The space domain is critical to modern commerce, scientific discovery and national security,” said DARPA Director Stefanie Tompkins in January. “The ability to accomplish leapahead advances in space technology through the DRACO nuclear thermal rocket program will be essential for more efficiently and quickly transporting material to the moon and eventually, people to Mars.”
NASA’s investment of up to $300 million, which is already in its proposed federal budget request, includes costs for the design and development of the nuclear-powered engine and technical oversight. The efforts fall in step with the needs of its Artemis program, which looks to return humans for a permanent presence on the moon, but then expand to Mars and other deep-space destinations.
“This demonstration will be a crucial step in meeting our moon-to-Mars objectives for crew transportation into deep space,” said NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy.
The nuclear thermal rocket plans aim to provide about the same energy as current chemical rocket propulsion, but can be two to three times more efficient, said DARPA program manager Tabitha Dodson. That means a potential to trade of fuel space for more cargo, while also allowing for more power for on-board instruments.
“With a successful demonstration, we could significantly advance humanity’s means for going faster and farther in space and pave the way for the future deployment for all fission-based nuclear space technologies,” Dodson said.
She said that could also mean shorter duration missions as the fuel would allow for more aggressive trajectories or creative burn profiles, especially for cargo missions. It also allows for abort mission options for long-distance travel that wouldn’t have been possible before, which is an added layer of safety for humans.
Lockheed Martin, based in Littleton, Colorado, has a history of working with nuclear power controls for earthbound projects such as power plants and submarines as well as building some of NASA’s radioisotope thermoelectric generators for planetary missions. It’s partnering with BWXT Advanced Technologies of Lynchburg, Virginia, which will develop the nuclear reactor for the spacecraft. The contract calls for Lockheed Martin to head up spacecraft design, integration and testing.
“This is a prime technology that can be used to transport humans and materials to the moon,” said Lockheed Martin Space’s Kirk Shireman with the company’s Lunar Exploration Campaigns program. “A safe, reusable nuclear tug spacecraft would revolutionize cislunar operations. With more speed, agility and maneuverability, nuclear thermal propulsion also has many national security applications for cislunar space.”
Lockheed is involved in NASA’s other Mars endeavors as well including being chosen to be what could be the first spacecraft to ever launch from the Red Planet, an ascent vehicle to be part of the Mars Sample Return mission. Its main connection with NASA’s Artemis, though, comes through the Orion spacecraft. To what end it will be used on future Mars missions has yet to be mapped out.
The end goal of the shift to nuclear powered spacecraft is to make space travel faster. Right now with chemical propulsion, a one-way trip to Mars, for instance, would take around nine months with optimum planetary positions, which also limits the launch window.
“These more powerful and efficient nuclear thermal propulsion systems can provide faster transit times between destinations,” Shireman said. “Reducing transit time is vital for human missions to Mars to limit a crew’s exposure to radiation.”
BWXT will fabricate the fuel called HALEU, which stands for high-assay low-enriched uranium. The raw materials will be provided by the Department of Energy.
Dodson said BWXT will be building in several safety measures around the reactor core that will take even the more remote possibility of an accident off the board.
“It’s almost like wearing four or five seat belts at the same time,” she said.
The nuclear reaction will still be heating cryogenic fuel to provide propulsion, and will reach temperatures of around 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit, one of the factors with which NASA has a lot of experience.
“NASA is uniquely positioned to provide guidance on the challenging rocket engine and cryogenic fluid management specifications with liquid hydrogen to meet specific mission needs,” Dodson said.
She said the mission will run through several experiments with the reactor at various power levels before opening it up to a full-power test.
The spacecraft won’t be too large, so it can fly in a Falcon 9 or Vulcan Centaur with a planned orbit of at least 430 miles altitude.
Shireman said it will be manufactured in a number of places joking, “As much as I’d love to do it my garage, they won’t let me bring new uranium into my garage so the spacecraft will be manufactured largely in Denver.”