Aallegra.367
net.space
utzoo!decvax!harpo!zeppo!wheps!ihnss!mhtsa!allegra!phr
Tue Apr 27 20:16:36 1982
Nuclear Power in Space
The US has in fact orbited one nuclear reactor, SNAP 10A, in the early
60's. There's been a fair amount of talk about using rotating bed
reactors to power orbiting lasers, and work on nuclear rockets
continues on a small scale, although this is all on the ground.
NERVA was cancelled for lack of funds, not through any commitment
to not use nuclear power in space. There hasn't been any because
things just happened that way (although public outcry might make
any other course difficult).
[SNAP stands for Secondary Nuclear Auxiliary Power; the "Secondary"
refers to RTG type generators. In fact, all the SNAP systems launched
except for 10A have been of the RTG type].
See the superb book "Enterprise", by Jerry Grey, for more details.
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