Rovers, reactors and 'green' rockets all on NASA's future-technology list Aviation Week & Space Technology, 06/04/2007, page 50 Frank Morring, Jr., Washington
Some advanced technology for long-term human space exploration is already getting on-orbit checkout as NASA targets about $350 million from its tight exploration budget this year on the long-lead items that may enable a return to the Moon en route to Mars. The Exploration Systems Mission Directorate (ESMD) is concentrating some of its Exploration Technology Development Program on near-term items needed to enable its Orion crew exploration vehicle and Ares I human-rated launcher, such as a 5-meter-dia. ablative heat shield able to withstand reentry at lunar-return velocities. But the program also is funding advanced-technology research ranging from composite space radiators that might save weight on Orion to a 5-ton nuclear reactor that would generate power for the outpost NASA plans to build on the Moon as a proving ground for expeditions to Mars. "Our objectives are to mature advanced technologies and transition them into the Constellation systems program to enable major capabilities like landing on the Moon or making the lunar outpost sustainable," says Chris Moore, program executive for technology at ESMD, referring to NASA's overall effort to build spacecraft and habitats for exploration. "They're also to reduce future mission risk, and just to enhance the performance of future exploration systems." <snip> A big objective of the lunar outpost will be to test exploration technologies and techniques that can enable subsequent human exploration on Mars. Engineers at JSC are working on a variety of ISRU techniques to extract oxygen from the lunar regolith, as much for the experience as the resource.
Along the same lines, NASA and the Energy Dept. are working under a scaled-back version of the old Project Prometheus to advance some of the technologies that would be needed for a five-metric-ton, 40-kw. fission reactor that would take over from the solar power plant scheduled to provide initial power for the outpost. It would be fueled with uranium dioxide and cooled with a sodium/potassium liquid alloy. "We want to use the Moon as a testbed for Mars, so we would test out this system on the Moon," Moore says. "We have some initial concepts that use Sterling converters, liquid-metal cooling. Our plan is to develop a lot of the non-nuclear technologies like the coolant system and the power conversion system and test it out in the next few years."
