Nuclear propulsion

{{Main|Nuclear marine propulsion}}

File:USS Nimitz in Victoria Canada 036.jpg of the {{sclass|Nimitz|aircraft carrier|0}} of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers]]

Image:Delta-II class nuclear-powered ballistic missle submarine 3.jpg nuclear-powered submarine]]

Nuclear-powered vessels are mainly military submarines, and aircraft carriers. Russia is the only country that currently has nuclear-powered civilian surface ships, mainly icebreakers. The US Navy currently (as of 2022) has 11 aircraft carriers and 70 submarines in service, that are all powered by nuclear reactors. For more detailed articles see:

• See Nuclear marine propulsion
• List of civilian nuclear ships

• Nuclear navy
• List of United States Naval reactors
• Soviet naval reactors
• Nuclear submarine

{{Main|Status-6 Oceanic Multipurpose System}}

Russia's Channel One Television news broadcast a picture and details of a nuclear-powered torpedo called Status-6 on about 12 November 2015. The torpedo was stated as having a range of up to 10,000 km, a cruising speed of 100 knots, and an operational depth of up to 1000 metres below the surface. The torpedo carried a 100-megaton nuclear warhead.[https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34797252 Russia reveals giant nuclear torpedo in state TV 'leak'], BBC news,

12 November 2015 - retrieved 27 November 2015

One of the suggestions emerging in the summer of 1958 from the first meeting of the scientific advisory group that became JASON was for "a nuclear-powered torpedo that could roam the seas almost indefinitely".{{cite magazine|title=Jason: Can a Cold Warrior Find Work?|url=https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.254.5036.1284|magazine=Science Magazine|date=November 29, 1991|page=1284|volume=254|number=5036|access-date=March 22, 2025}}

{{main|Nuclear-powered aircraft}}

File:HTRE-3.jpg system, known as HTRE-3 (Heat Transfer Reactor Experiment no. 3). The central EBR-1 based reactor took the place of chemical fuel combustion to heat the air. The reactor rapidly raised the temperature via an air heat exchanger and powered the dual J47 engines in a number of ground tests.{{cite journal|last=Thornton|first=G|author2=Blumbeg, B.|title=Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion Heat Transfer Reactor Experiments Fulfill Test Goals|journal=Nucleonics|date=January 1961|volume=19|issue=1|publisher=McGraw-Hill|issn=0096-6207}}]]

Research into nuclear-powered aircraft was pursued during the Cold War by the United States and the Soviet Union as they would presumably allow a country to keep nuclear bombers in the air for extremely long periods of time, a useful tactic for nuclear deterrence. Neither country created any operational nuclear aircraft. One design problem, never adequately solved, was the need for heavy shielding to protect the crew from radiation sickness. Since the advent of ICBMs in the 1960s the tactical advantage of such aircraft was greatly diminished and respective projects were cancelled. Because the technology was inherently dangerous it was not considered in non-military contexts. Nuclear-powered missiles were also researched and discounted during the same period.

• Convair X-6
• Myasishchev M-50 - Aviation Week hoax{{Cite web |last=Norris |first=Guy |url=http://aviationweek.com/blog/false-starts-aviation-s-atomic-age |title=False Starts For Aviation's Atomic Age |work=Aviation Week |date=14 October 2014 |access-date=17 October 2014}}
• Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion - General Electric's project to build a nuclear-powered bomber
• Tupolev Tu-95LAL

• Project Pluto - which developed the SLAM missile, that used a nuclear-powered air ramjet for propulsion
• Burevestnik nuclear-powered cruise missile announced by Vladimir Putin in 2018.{{Cite web |last= Gady |first=Franz-Stefan |url=https://thediplomat.com/2018/03/russia-reveals-unstoppable-nuclear-powered-cruise-missile/ |title=Russia Reveals 'Unstoppable' Nuclear-Powered Cruise Missile |work=The Diplomat |date=2 March 2018 |access-date=26 March 2018}}

{{main|Nuclear power in space}}

The attraction of nuclear propulsion and power in space is built on the high efficiency and theoretical capability that can be delivered with a nuclear system, namely energy efficiency of the system and endurance/capacity of the system to function over long distances.{{cite report|url=http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2013/ph241/micks1/ |title= A Survey of Nuclear Propulsion Technologies for Space Applications|author=Ashley Micks|date=March 15, 2013|publisher=Stanford University|access-date=March 23, 2025}} In balance, the systems needed to protect humans in both the space-lift and operations phase are significant detriments. Many types of nuclear propulsion have been proposed as follows.{{cite report|url=http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2013/ph241/micks1/docs/nasa-tm-x-1864.pdf |first1=W. E. |last1=Moeckel|title=Propulsion Systems for Manned Exploration of the Solar System (NASA TM X-1864)|publisher=U. S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration |date=August 1969|access-date=January 15, 2023}}

{{main|Nuclear pulse propulsion}}

• Project Orion, first engineering design study of nuclear pulse (i.e., atomic explosion) propulsion{{cite report|url=http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2013/ph241/micks1/docs/aiaa-2000-3856.pdf |first1=G. R. |last1=Schmidt|first2=J. A. |last2=Bonometti |first3=P. J. |last3=Morton|title=Nuclear Pulse Propulsion: Orion and Beyond (AIAA 2000-3856) |publisher= Am. Inst. Aero. Astro.|date=July 2000|access-date=January 15, 2023}}
• Project Daedalus, 1970s British Interplanetary Society study of a fusion rocket
• Project Longshot, US Naval Academy-NASA nuclear pulse propulsion design
• AIMStar, a proposed Antimatter-catalyzed nuclear pulse propulsion craft that uses clouds of antiprotons to initiate fission and fusion within fuel pellets
• ICAN-II, a proposed crewed interplanetary spacecraft that used the antimatter-catalyzed nuclear pulse propulsion engine as its main form of propulsion
• External Pulsed Plasma Propulsion (EPPP), a propulsion concept by NASA that derives its thrust from plasma waves generated from a series of small, supercritical fission/fusion pulses behind an object in space.{{cite report|url=https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20000021516.pdf |title=External Pulsed Plasma Propulsion (EPPP)|date=January 1, 1999|publisher=NASA|access-date=January 15, 2023}}

{{main|Nuclear thermal rocket}}

File: Bimodal Nuclear Thermal Rocket.jpg (2010).]]

Bimodal nuclear thermal rockets conduct nuclear fission reactions similar to those employed at nuclear power plants including submarines. The energy is used to heat the liquid hydrogen propellant.{{cite report |url=https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19960001947/downloads/19960001947.pdf |title=Nuclear Thermal Rocket/Vehicle Design Options for Future NASA Missions to the Moon and Mars (NASA-TM-0107071) |author1=Stanley K. Borowski |author2=Robert R. Corban |author3=Melissa L. McGuire |author4=Erik G. Beke |publisher=NASA|date=September 1993|access-date=March 23, 2025}} Advocates of nuclear-powered spacecraft point out that at the time of launch, there is almost no radiation released from the nuclear reactors. Nuclear-powered rockets are not used to lift off the Earth. Nuclear thermal rockets can provide great performance advantages compared to chemical propulsion systems. Nuclear power sources could also be used to provide the spacecraft with electrical power for operations and scientific instrumentation.{{cite web

|author=Contact: Gynelle C. Steele

|title=Bimodal Nuclear Thermal Rocket Propulsion Investigated for Power-Rich, Artificial-Gravity Human Exploration Missions to Mars

|url=http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/RT/2004/PB/PBM-mcguire.html

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060219013840/http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/RT/2004/PB/PBM-mcguire.html

|url-status=dead

|archive-date=February 19, 2006

|publisher=NASA Glenn's Research & Technology

|date= July 15, 2005

|access-date=2009-07-08

}}

Examples:

• NERVA (Nuclear Energy for Rocket Vehicle Applications), a US nuclear thermal rocket program.{{cite AV media |title=Nuclear Space Propulsion: NASA 1968 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b18HtG0DOCM|publisher=NASA |access-date=March 22, 2025}}
• Project Rover, an American project to develop a nuclear thermal rocket. The program ran at the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory from 1955 through 1972.
• Project Timberwind (1987–1991), part of the Strategic Defense Initiative
• RD-0410, a Soviet nuclear thermal rocket engine developed from 1965 through the 1980s
• Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO), under development in the 2020s

• Bussard ramjet, a conceptual interstellar fusion ramjet named after Robert W. Bussard.

• Fission fragment rocket
• Fission sail
• Fusion rocket
• Gas core reactor rocket
• Nuclear salt-water rocket
• Radioisotope rocket
• Nuclear photonic rocket

{{main|Nuclear electric rocket}}

Nuclear electric propulsion is a type of spacecraft propulsion system where a nuclear reactor generates thermal energy which is converted to electrical energy, that drives an ion thruster or other electrical spacecraft propulsion technology.{{cite book |author=David Buden|date=2011|url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Space_Nuclear_Fission_Electric_Power_Sys/WB6UygAACAAJ?hl=en |title=Space Nuclear Fission Electric Power Systems |publisher=Polaris Books|access-date=March 23, 2025}} Examples of nuclear electric systems:

• Project Prometheus, NASA development of nuclear propulsion for long-duration spaceflight, begun in 2003.{{cite report|title=Prometheus Project final report |last=Randall|first=Taylor |url=https://dataverse.jpl.nasa.gov/dataset.xhtml?persistentId=hdl:2014/38185 |date=October 1, 2005 |publisher=NASA |access-date=March 23, 2025}}
• Transport and Energy Module (TEM). In April 2011, Anatoly Perminov, head of the Russian Federal Space Agency, announced that it is going to develop a nuclear-powered spacecraft for deep space travel.{{Cite web |url=http://inhabitat.com/russian-space-agency-announces-plans-to-build-nuclear-powered-deep-space-rocket/ |title=Russian Space Agency Announces Plans to Build Nuclear-Powered Deep Space Rocket |access-date=2017-04-20 |archive-date=2017-04-20 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170420235410/http://inhabitat.com/russian-space-agency-announces-plans-to-build-nuclear-powered-deep-space-rocket/ |url-status=dead }}{{cite web|url= https://www.space-travel.com/reports/Russia_And_US_To_Discuss_Nuke_Powered_Spaceship_Project_999.html |title=Russia And US To Discuss Nuke-Powered Spaceship Project|date=April 5, 2011|website=space-travel.com|access-date=March 23, 2025}} Preliminary design was done by 2013, and 9 more years are planned for development (in space assembly). The price is set at 17 billion rubles (600 million dollars).{{cite news|url=https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2009/1029/russians-to-ride-a-nuclear-powered-spacecraft-to-mars |title=Russians to ride a nuclear-powered spacecraft to Mars |date=October 9, 2009|author=Fred Weir|publisher=The Christian Science Monitor|access-date=March 23, 2025}} The nuclear propulsion would offer mega-watt class power and would consist of a space nuclear power and a matrix of ion engines{{cite web|url=https://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/04/05/russia_nasa_nuclear_spacecraft/|title=Russia, NASA to hold talks on nuclear-powered spacecraft. Muscovites have the balls but not the money|last=Page|first=Lewis|date=5 April 2011|website=The Register|access-date=26 December 2013}}{{cite magazine |url=https://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles_2012/Fall-Winter_2012/Interview_Koroteyev.pdf|title=Interview: Academician Anatoly Koroteyev An Inside Look at Russia's Nuclear Power Propulsion System|magazine=21st Century Science and Technology|issue=Fall/Winter 2012-2013 |publisher=21st Century |access-date=26 December 2013|date=3 December 2012}} According to Perminov, the propulsion will be able to support human mission to Mars, with cosmonauts staying on the Red planet for 30 days. This journey to Mars with nuclear propulsion and a steady acceleration would take six weeks, instead of eight months by using chemical propulsion – assuming thrust of 300 times higher than that of chemical propulsion.{{Cite web |url=http://www.federalspace.ru/main.php?id=2&nid=11297&lang=en |title=Space Propulsion for Martian Mission may be Developed in 6-9 Years |access-date=2011-07-11 |archive-date=2011-04-05 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110405134402/http://www.federalspace.ru/main.php?id=2&nid=11297&lang=en |url-status=dead }}{{cite web|url=https://www.wired.com/2009/11/nuclear-propulsion-in-space/ |title=Russia Leads Nuclear Space Race After U.S. Drops Out |date=November 3, 2009|website=Wired|author=Alexis Madrigal |access-date=March 22, 2025}}

The idea of making cars that used radioactive material, radium, for fuel dates back to at least 1903. Analysis of the concept in 1937 indicated that the driver of such a vehicle might need a 50-ton lead barrier to shield them from radiation.The Science Review, Issues 1-12, University of Melbourne Science Club, Melbourne University, 1937, page 22

In 1941, a Caltech physicist named R. M. Langer espoused the idea of a car powered by uranium-235 in the January edition of Popular Mechanics. He was followed by William Bushnell Stout, designer of the Stout Scarab and former Society of Engineers president, on 7 August 1945 in The New York Times. The problem of shielding the reactor continued to render the idea impractical.Automobile Quarterly, Volume 31 Number 1, 1992, pages 14-29 In December 1945, a John Wilson of London, announced he had created an atomic car. This created considerable interest. The Minister of Fuel and Power along with a large press contingent turned out to view it. The car did not show and Wilson claimed that it had been sabotaged. A later court case found that he was a fraud and there was no nuclear-powered car.{{cite news|title=First Atomic Car "sabotaged" |url=https://www.newspapers.com/embed/168653704/ |publisher=Townsville Daily Bulletin |location=Queensland, Australia |date=3 December 1945 |page=2|access-date=March 23, 2025|via=Newspapers.com}}{{cite news |title=Atomic Car" hoax - Elderly inventor gets GAOL sentence |url=https://www.newspapers.com/embed/168654294/|publisher= Cairns Post |location=Queensland Australia |date=22 July 1946 |page=3 |access-date=March 23, 2025|via=Newspapers.com}}

Despite the shielding problem, through the late 1940s and early 1950s debate continued around the possibility of nuclear-powered cars. The development of nuclear-powered submarines and ships, and experiments to develop a nuclear-powered aircraft at that time kept the idea alive.{{cite news|title=Benson Ford poses challenge on atomic powered automobiles|url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/52868920/?terms=%22atomic%2Bpowered%2Bcar%22|newspaper=The Brooklyn Daily Eagle|date=October 2, 1951|page=3|via = Newspapers.com|access-date = June 4, 2015}} {{Open access}} Russian papers in the mid-1950s reported the development of a nuclear-powered car by Professor V P Romadin, but again shielding proved to be a problem.{{cite news|title=Russ Claim Atomic Car Invented, But Drivers May Die |url=https://www.newspapers.com/embed/168654785/|date=February 20, 1955|publisher=The Register|location=Santa Ana California|page=43|access-date=March 23, 2025|via=Newspapers.com}} It was claimed that its laboratories had overcome the shielding problem with a new alloy that absorbed the rays.{{cite news|url=https://www.newspapers.com/embed/168665992/ |title=Atom-Powered Automobile Claimed by Russian Scientists|publisher=The Victoria Advocate|location=Victoria, Texas|date=January 30, 1955|access-date=March 23, 2025 |page=12}}

In 1958, at the height of the 1950s American automobile culture there were at least four theoretical nuclear-powered concept cars proposed, the American Ford Nucleon and Studebaker Packard Astral, as well as the French Simca Fulgur designed by Robert Opron{{cite web|title=Radioactive cars of the twentieth century|url=http://specialcarnews.com/?p=292|access-date=26 April 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181026182824/http://specialcarnews.com/?p=292|archive-date=26 October 2018|url-status=dead}}{{cite web|title=Une anticipation Simca : la "fulgur"|url=http://a21.idata.over-blog.com/1/09/44/33/vehicules/fulgur/214b93a9d10c06e.jpg|access-date=26 April 2012|language=fr}} and the Arbel Symétric. Apart from these concept models, none were built and no automotive nuclear power plants ever made. Chrysler engineer C R Lewis had discounted the idea in 1957 because of estimates that an {{convert|80000|lb|abbr=on|adj=on}} engine would be required by a {{convert|3000|lb|abbr=on|adj=on}} car. His view was that an efficient means of storing energy was required for nuclear power to be practical.{{cite magazine|magazine=Popular Mechanics|title=Keeping up with the atom: The Atom powered car|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PeEDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA141|date=April 1957|publisher=Hearst Magazines|page=141}} Despite this, Chrysler's stylists in 1958 drew up some possible designs.

In 1959 it was reported that Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company had developed a new rubber compound that was light and absorbed radiation, obviating the need for heavy shielding. A reporter at the time considered it might make nuclear-powered cars and aircraft a possibility.{{cite news|title=New Device Speeds Day of Atom-Powered Plane |url=https://www.newspapers.com/embed/168677254/ |author=Ray Cromley |publisher=The Daily Item |location=Lynn, Massachusetts|date=June 23, 1959|access-date=March 23, 2025|via=newspapers.com}}

Ford made another potentially nuclear-powered model in 1962 for the Seattle World's Fair, the Ford Seattle-ite XXI.{{cite web|last=Hanlon|first=Mike|title=Ford Seattle-ite: one of history's most significant concept cars|url=http://www.gizmag.com/ford-seattle-ite-one-of-historys-most-significant-concept-cars/2798/|work=Gizmag.com|date=4 June 2004 |access-date=26 April 2012}}{{cite web|title=1962 Ford Seattle-ite XXI|url=http://forum.love-fords.org/content.php?165-1962-Ford-Seattle-ite-XXI|access-date=26 April 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130512180911/http://forum.love-fords.org/content.php?165-1962-Ford-Seattle-ite-XXI|archive-date=12 May 2013|url-status=dead}} This also never went beyond the initial concept.

In 2009, for the hundredth anniversary of General Motors' acquisition of Cadillac, Loren Kulesus created concept art depicting a car powered by thorium.{{cite web|url=https://nationalspeedinc.com/cadillac-world-thorium-fuel-concept-cadillac-wtf/ |title=Cadillac World Thorium Fuel Concept (Cadillac WTF?) |date=January 14, 2009 |website=nationalspeedinc.com|access-date=March 22, 2025}}

The Chrysler TV-8 was an experimental concept tank designed by Chrysler in the 1950s. The tank was intended to be a nuclear-powered medium tank capable of land and amphibious warfare. The design was never mass-produced.{{cite book |title=A History of the American Main Battle Tank, Volume 2: Abrams |isbn=9780891413882 |last = Hunnicutt |first = RP |publisher=Presidio |location=United States |year=1990|page=36}}

The X-12 was a nuclear powered locomotive, proposed in a feasibility study done in 1954 at the University of Utah.{{Citation |title=An Atomic Locomotive |last=Abel |first=G.K. |url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015020157130 |access-date=2023-12-14 |year=1954 |last2=Borst |first2=L.B. |last3=Bowie |first3=D.M. |last4=Petty |first4=K.W. |last5=Stover |first5=B.J. |last6=Van Dilla |first6=M.A.}}

The Mars rovers Curiosity and Perseverance are powered by a radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG), like the successful Viking 1 and Viking 2 Mars landers in 1976.{{cite web |url=http://www.ne.doe.gov/pdfFiles/MMRTG_Jan2008.pdf |title=Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator |publisher=NASA/JPL |date=January 1, 2008 |access-date=August 6, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120813024104/http://www.ne.doe.gov/pdfFiles/MMRTG_Jan2008.pdf |archive-date=August 13, 2012 }}{{cite web |url=http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/fact_sheets/mars-power-heating.pdf |title=Mars Exploration: Radioisotope Power and Heating for Mars Surface Exploration |publisher=NASA/JPL |date=April 18, 2006 |access-date=September 7, 2009 |archive-date=October 12, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121012013153/http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/fact_sheets/mars-power-heating.pdf |url-status=dead }}

{{Portal|Nuclear technology}}

• Safe Affordable Fission Engine
• Electrically powered spacecraft propulsion

• {{Cite report |last1= Bussard |first1= Robert |last2= DeLauer |first2= Richard |title= Nuclear Rocket Propulsion |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Nuclear_Rocket_Propulsion/Q6RxAAAAMAAJ?hl=en |publisher= McGraw-Hill |year= 1958 |access-date=March 23, 2025}}
• {{Cite book |last1= Bussard |first1= Robert |last2= DeLauer |first2= Richard |title= Fundamentals of Nuclear Flight |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Fundamentals_of_Nuclear_Flight/NGmmAAAAIAAJ?hl=en |publisher= McGraw-Hill |year= 1965 |access-date=March 23, 2025}}
• {{cite report|url=http://www.aresinstitute.org/spherelab/papers/third_party/Advanced%20Fusion%20Energy%20System.pdf |author=Robert W. Bussard |title=An advanced fusion energy system for outer-planet space propulsion |date=2003|publisher=Ares Institute|access-date=March 23, 2025}}
• {{cite journal|title=Atomic Power — In your car|journal=Motor Trend|date=April 1951|first=Harry|last=Cushin|url=http://www.motortrend.com/features/archive/112_0711_archive_1965_mako_shark_ii_concept_car/photo_02.html|access-date=2012-04-23|archive-date=2015-05-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150513080553/http://www.motortrend.com/features/archive/112_0711_archive_1965_mako_shark_ii_concept_car/photo_02.html|url-status=dead}}

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