Reference Reactor Module for the Affordable Fission Surface Power System
- Nuclear Systems Design Group, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico, 87545 (United States)
Surface fission power systems on the Moon and Mars may provide the first US application of fission reactor technology in space since 1965. The requirements of many surface power applications allow the consideration of systems with much less development risk than most other space reactor applications, because of modest power (10s of kWe) and no driving need for minimal mass (allowing temperatures <1000 K). The Affordable Fission Surface Power System (AFSPS) study was completed by NASA/DOE to determine the cost of a modest performance, low-technical risk surface power system. This paper describes the reference AFSPS reactor module concept, which is designed to provide a net power of 40 kWe for 8 years on the lunar surface; note, the system has been designed with technologies that are fully compatible with a Martian surface application. The reactor concept uses stainless-steel based, UO{sub 2}-fueled, liquid metal-cooled fission reactor coupled to free-piston Stirling converters. The reactor shielding approach utilizes both in-situ and launched shielding to keep the dose to astronauts much lower than the natural background radiation on the lunar surface. One of the important 'affordability' attributes is that the concept has been designed to minimize both the technical and programmatic safety risk.
- OSTI ID:
- 21043562
- Journal Information:
- AIP Conference Proceedings, Vol. 969, Issue 1; Conference: Space Technology and Applications International Forum-STAIF 2008: 12. conference on thermophysics applications in microgravity; 1. symposium on space resource utilization; 25. symposium on space nuclear power and propulsion; 6. conference on human/robotic technology and the vision for space exploration; 6. symposium on space colonization; 5. symposium on new frontiers and future concept, Albuquerque, NM (United States), 10-14 Feb 2008; Other Information: DOI: 10.1063/1.2844978; (c) 2008 American Institute of Physics; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0094-243X
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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