BC: HOUSEHOLD FISSION PLANT
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Kilopower: What’s Next?
Posted on January 18, 2018
When astronauts someday venture to the Moon, Mars and other destinations, one of the first and most important resources they will need is power. A reliable and efficient power system will be essential for day-to-day necessities, such as lighting, water and oxygen, and for mission objectives, like running experiments and producing fuel for the long journey home.
That’s why NASA is conducting experiments on Kilopower, a new power source that could provide safe, efficient and plentiful energy for future robotic and human space exploration missions.
This pioneering space fission power system could provide up to 10 kilowatts of electrical power — enough to run two average households — continuously for at least ten years. Four Kilopower units would provide enough power to establish an outpost.
About the Experiment
The prototype power system was designed and developed by NASA’s Glenn Research Center in collaboration with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and the Los Alamos National Laboratory, while the reactor core was provided by the Y12 National Security Complex. NASA Glenn shipped the prototype power system from Cleveland to the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS) in late September.
The team at the NNSS recently began tests on the reactor core. According to NASA Glenn’s Marc Gibson, the Kilopower lead engineer, the team will connect the power system to the core and begin end-to-end checkouts this month. Gibson says the experiments should conclude with a full-power test lasting approximately 28 hours in late March.
The Kilopower advantage
Fission power can provide abundant energy anywhere we want humans or robots to go. On Mars, the sun’s power varies widely throughout the seasons, and periodic dust storms can last for months. On the Moon, the cold lunar night lingers for 14 days.
“We want a power source that can handle extreme environments,” says Lee Mason, NASA’s principal technologist for power and energy storage. “Kilopower opens up the full surface of Mars, including the northern latitudes where water may reside. On the Moon, Kilopower could be deployed to help search for resources in permanently shadowed craters.”
In these challenging environments, power generation from sunlight is difficult and fuel supply is limited. Kilopower is lightweight, reliable and efficient, which makes it just right for the job.
For more information about the Kilopower project, visit:
nasa.gov
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Demonstration Proves Nuclear Fission System Can Provide Space Exploration Power
Posted on May 2, 2018
 Artist’s concept of new fission power system on the lunar surface.
Credits: NASA
NASA and the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) have successfully demonstrated a new nuclear reactor power system that could enable long-duration crewed missions to the Moon, Mars and destinations beyond.
NASA announced the results of the demonstration, called the Kilopower Reactor Using Stirling Technology (KRUSTY) experiment,during a news conference Wednesday at its Glenn Research Center in Cleveland. The Kilopower experimentwas conducted at the NNSA’s Nevada National Security Site from November 2017 through March.
“Safe, efficient and plentiful energy will be the key to future robotic and human exploration,” said Jim Reuter, NASA’s acting associate administrator for the Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) in Washington. “I expect the Kilopower project to be an essential part of lunar and Mars power architectures as they evolve.”
 NASA and NNSA engineers lower the wall of the vacuum chamber around the Kilowatt Reactor Using Stirling TechnologY (KRUSTY system). The vacuum chamber is later evacuated to simulate the conditions of space when KRUSTY operates.
Credits: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Kilopower is a small, lightweight fission power system capable of providing up to 10 kilowatts of electrical power – enough to run several average households – continuously for at least 10 years. Four Kilopower units would provide enough power to establish an outpost.
According to Marc Gibson, lead Kilopower engineer at Glenn, the pioneering power system is ideal for the Moon, where power generation from sunlight is difficult because lunar nights are equivalent to 14 days on Earth.
“Kilopower gives us the ability to do much higher power missions, and to explore the shadowed craters of the Moon,” said Gibson. “When we start sending astronauts for long stays on the Moon and to other planets, that’s going to require a new class of power that we’ve never needed before.”
The prototype power system uses a solid, cast uranium-235 reactor core, about the size of a paper towel roll. Passive sodium heat pipes transfer reactor heat to high-efficiency Stirling engines, which convert the heat to electricity.
According to David Poston, the chief reactor designer at NNSA’s Los Alamos National Laboratory, the purpose of the recent experiment in Nevada was two-fold: to demonstrate that the system can create electricity with fission power, and to show the system is stable and safe no matter what environment it encounters.
“We threw everything we could at this reactor, in terms of nominal and off-normal operating scenarios and KRUSTY passed with flying colors,” said Poston.
 Kilowatt Reactor Using Stirling TechnologY (KRUSTY) control room during the full-power run, Marc Gibson (GRC/NASA) and David Poston (LANL/NNSA) in foreground, Geordie McKenzie (LANL/NNSA) and Joetta Goda (LANL/NNSA) in background.
Credits: Los Alamos National Laboratory
The Kilopower team conducted the experiment in four phases. The first two phases, conducted without power, confirmed that each component of the system behaved as expected. During the third phase, the team increased power to heat the core incrementally before moving on to the final phase. The experiment culminated with a 28-hour, full-power test that simulated a mission, including reactor startup, ramp to full power, steady operation and shutdown.
Throughout the experiment, the team simulated power reduction, failed engines and failed heat pipes, showing that the system could continue to operate and successfully handle multiple failures.
“We put the system through its paces,” said Gibson. “We understand the reactor very well, and this test proved that the system works the way we designed it to work. No matter what environment we expose it to, the reactor performs very well.”
The Kilopower project is developing mission concepts and performing additional risk reduction activities to prepare for a possible future flight demonstration. The project will remain a part of the STMD’s Game Changing Development program with the goal of transitioning to the Technology Demonstration Mission program in Fiscal Year 2020.
Such a demonstration could pave the way for future Kilopower systems that power human outposts on the Moon and Mars, including missions that rely on In-situ Resource Utilization to produce local propellants and other materials.
The Kilopower project is led by Glenn, in partnership with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama,and NNSA, including its Los Alamos National Laboratory, Nevada National Security Site and Y-12 National Security Complex.
For more information about the Kilopower project, including images and video, visit:
nasa.gov
Jan Wittry
Glenn Research Center, Cleveland
216-433-5466
jan.m.wittry-1@nasa.gov
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 Engineers work on the Kilopower nuclear reactor, a system being designed to power NASA missions. NASA
NASA is working on a nuclear reactor to power (and later propel) deep-space exploration, such as human missions to the moon and Mars. Kilopower is a 1- to 10-kilowatt design that could theoretically power a US home for hundreds of years.A recent full-power test in Nevada met or exceeded all of the government's expectations.The risk posed by the new technology could be far less than any other reactors in use today.
While nuclear power plants across America are shutting down, NASA is perfecting a new type of fission reactor.
The device, called Kilopower, could enable unprecedented exploration of the moon, Mars, and elsewhere in the solar system. Researchers announced on Wednesday that a prototype has successfully passed a battery of tests.
 An artist's rendition of the Kilopower fission reactor and its radiator on the moon. NASA
"This is the first new reactor not just for space and not just for NASA, but of any kind in the US in 40 years," David Poston, the project's chief designer at Los Alamos National Laboratory, said during a press conference Wednesday. "We demonstrated a concept that NASA can use right now. It's ready for a flight program."
NASA and the National Nuclear Security Administration have worked toward this make-or-break test of Kilopower for about five years and announced it in January. During the experiment, researchers ran the uranium-fueled reactor for 28 hours at full power.
"This really is the first step in using fission power in space," Poston said.
A slide shown during the press conference went further: "Kilopower is the first step towards truly astounding space fission capabilities," it said.
The problem of power in spaceNASA has some big goals. The agency is developing a huge rocket called the Space Launch System, wants to set up a space station near the moon, plans to send missions to the lunar surface, and, might even rocket astronauts toward Mars sometime in the 2030s.
But to do all that, NASA has to figure out how to generate enough power to run systems that are vital to a long-term presence in space.
 An artist's concept of NASA's Deep Space Gateway (left) space station near the moon. NASA
"We are likely going to need large power sources not dependent on the sun, especially if we want to live off the land," James Reuter, the acting associate administrator of NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate, said during the press conference. "For example, water ice is a critical resource present in lunar soil, and it can be extracted and used, but it takes a lot of energy to do so."
Bases off of Earth would also need to power systems that recycle water, refresh air supplies, generate fuel, illuminate greenhouses, and more.
"Our studies say that we would probably need up to 40 kilowatts of power on the moon, and then later on the surface of Mars," Reuter said.
 An illustration of four 10-kilowatt Kilopower reactor units on Mars. LANLCurrently, space missions usually rely on solar power or fuel cells. But a night on the moon lasts about 14 days, and sunlight is about 40% as strong at Mars as it is at Earth, so solar panels may be impossible to wholly depend on. Plus, Martian dust storms can coat solar panels.
Fuel cells, meanwhile, can be hazardous to use and run out of juice relatively quickly.
NASA does have small nuclear power supplies that enable ambitious robotic missions. But they run on the natural decay of plutonium-238 and don't provide more than a few hundred watts of electrical power. This form of plutonium is also expensive, difficult to make, and in short supply.
These power problems have led NASA to develop Kilopower, which runs on fission — the same process harnessed by nuclear power plants on Earth. The reactor is designed to be safe, long-lasting, reliable, scalable, and energy-dense.
"This technology, we believe, will very likely be the most effective means to power human surface missions," Reuter said.
How Kilopower works
 An illustration of a folded-up Kilopower nuclear reactor on the back of a Mars roving vehicle. NASA/YouTube; Business Insider
Kilopower is a small, patio-umbrella-shaped reactor that's practically immune to melting down.
The hope is that once Kilopower's capacity gets scaled up and the device becomes operational, astronauts could bury several units in the lunar or Martian soil, hook them up to their base, and let the system manage itself for 10 years or more.
That system relies on fission, which happens when atoms split, shoot out one or more neutrons, and release gobs of energy. But only a few variants of elements have the right properties to split nearby atoms, shoot out even more neutrons in the process, and sustain a chain-reaction.
Uranium-235 is one of the just-right atoms for this reaction, and it's what makes up the 6-inch-wide fuel core in Kilopower. On its own, such a small amount of U-235 can't fission well, so it's surrounded by a shield of beryllium - a metal that reflects neutrons back into the fuel, increasing the rate of fission and heat generation.
 A labeled diagram of a 10-kilowatt Kilopower nuclear reactor. NASA/YouTube; Business InsiderTo turn on and off, Kilopower uses a rod of boron carbide, which absorbs neutrons. When the rod is pulled out, the reactor turns on, since the neutrons can then move freely and fission other atoms. Sliding the rod back into the fuel core shuts down the chain-reaction.
Heat pipes filled with sodium metal soak up the warmth from the reactions and feed it to Stirling converters on top. Those converters use the heat to drive a piston-like device, which generates electricity as the heat moves through it. Keeping the converters cool — and a stream of heat flowing through them — is key to making electrical power. So a foldable, umbrella-like radiator made of titanium metal sits on top and radiates the waste heat out into the air or space.
In March, NASA tested that process in an experiment called Kilopower Reactor Using Stirling Technology, or KRUSTY. The test run generated about 100 watts of electrical power, or enough to run a bright incandescent lightbulb.
But Poston said Kilopower could easily scale up to 10 kilowatts — 100 times more, or enough to power a typical US home — and even megawatts.
He called the experiment "incredibly successful" and said it cost NASA relatively little.
"People thought it would cost billions of dollars to do these reactors," Poston said. "We showed we can design, build, and test a reactor for less than $20 million."
Why the technology is expected be safe
 Engineers install Kilopower nuclear reactor hardware at the Nevada National Security Site in March 2018. NNSSThe researchers behind Kilopower say it's incredibly safe to launch and use, even if there's a rocket explosion or other accident.
Unlike most reactors on Earth, Kilopower doesn't use liquid coolants like water. Water can be a problem because it can explosively turn into steam if it gets too hot, and it can more easily spread contaminants. Sodium in Kilopower's heat pipes, on the other hand, remains solid until it's melted by reactor heat.
Plus, uranium-235 isn't very radioactive, contrary to popular belief.
"If we were to have a launch accident, like an explosion or fire ... the actual dosage at a kilometer from the launch pad would be far, far less than background radiation, about 1 millirem," Patrick McClure, the project lead for Kilopower at Los Alamos National Laboratory, told Business Insider.
One millirem is roughly equivalent to a whole-mouth dental X-rayand, according to McClure, "vastly lower than an airplane flight."
The biggest risk would be if the device inadvertently turned on, though McClure hinted this is virtually impossible due to the way Kilopower is designed.
"Under all worst-case conditions, we don't think there's any chance the reactor would come on during a launch accident," he said.
The researchers behind the experiment hope to establish a program with NASA to build, test, and fly full-scale Kilopower units starting sometime in the next 18 months.
Poston said he eventually wants to develop space propulsion systems with Kilopower that "could get us places much quicker and much farther out than we could ever do with anything else."
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