Pulse nuclear rocket engine. Nuclear rocket engines and nuclear rocket electric propulsion systems

One could start this article with a traditional passage about how science fiction writers put forward bold ideas, and scientists then bring them to life. You can, but you don’t want to write with stamps. It is better to remember that modern rocket engines, solid propellant and liquid, have more than unsatisfactory characteristics for flights over relatively long distances. They allow you to launch cargo into Earth orbit and deliver something to the Moon, although such a flight is more expensive. But flying to Mars with such engines is no longer easy. Give them fuel and oxidizer in the required quantities. And these volumes are directly proportional to the distance that must be overcome.

An alternative to traditional chemical rocket engines are electric, plasma and nuclear engines. Of all the alternative engines, only one system has reached the stage of engine development - nuclear (Nuclear Reaction Engine). In the Soviet Union and the United States, work began on the creation of nuclear rocket engines back in the 50s of the last century. The Americans were working on both versions of such a power plant: reactive and pulsed. The first concept involves heating the working fluid using a nuclear reactor and then releasing it through nozzles. The pulse nuclear propulsion engine, in turn, propels the spacecraft through successive explosions of small amounts of nuclear fuel.

Also in the USA, the Orion project was invented, combining both versions of the nuclear powered engine. it was done as follows: small nuclear charges with a capacity of about 100 tons of TNT were ejected from the tail of the ship. Metal discs were fired after them. At a distance from the ship, the charge was detonated, the disk evaporated, and the substance scattered into different sides. Part of it fell into the reinforced tail section of the ship and moved it forward. A small increase in thrust should have been provided by the evaporation of the plate taking the blows. The unit cost of such a flight should have been only 150 then dollars per kilogram payload.

It even went as far as testing: experience showed that movement with the help of successive impulses is possible, as is the creation of a stern plate of sufficient strength. But the Orion project was closed in 1965 as unpromising. However, this is so far the only existing concept that can allow expeditions at least across the solar system.

It was only possible to reach the construction of a prototype with a nuclear powered rocket engine. These were the Soviet RD-0410 and the American NERVA. They worked on the same principle: in the “usual” nuclear reactor the working fluid heats up, which, when ejected from the nozzles, creates thrust. The working fluid of both engines was liquid hydrogen, but in the Soviet excipient heptane was used.

The thrust of the RD-0410 was 3.5 tons, NERVA gave almost 34, but it also had large dimensions: 43.7 meters in length and 10.5 in diameter versus 3.5 and 1.6 meters, respectively, for the Soviet engine. At the same time, the American engine was three times inferior to the Soviet one in terms of resource - the RD-0410 could work for an hour.

However, both engines, despite their promise, also remained on Earth and did not fly anywhere. Main reason the closure of both projects (NERVA in the mid-70s, RD-0410 in 1985) - money. The characteristics of chemical engines are worse than those of nuclear ones, but the cost of one launch of a ship with a nuclear propulsion engine with the same payload can be 8-12 times more than the launch of the same Soyuz with a liquid propellant engine. And this does not even take into account all the costs necessary to bring nuclear engines to the point of being suitable for practical use.

Decommissioning of "cheap" Shuttles and absence of lately Revolutionary breakthroughs in space technology require new solutions. In April of this year, the then head of Roscosmos A. Perminov announced his intention to develop and put into operation a completely new nuclear propulsion system. This is precisely what, in the opinion of Roscosmos, should radically improve the “situation” in the entire world cosmonautics. Now it has become clear who should become the next revolutionaries in astronautics: the development of nuclear propulsion engines will be carried out by the Keldysh Center Federal State Unitary Enterprise. General manager enterprise A. Koroteev has already pleased the public that preliminary design spacecraft for the new nuclear engine will be ready in next year. The engine design should be ready by 2019, with testing scheduled for 2025.

The complex was called TEM - transport and energy module. It will carry a gas-cooled nuclear reactor. The direct propulsion system has not yet been decided: either it will be a jet engine like the RD-0410, or an electric rocket engine (ERE). However, the latter type has not yet been widely used anywhere in the world: only three spacecraft were equipped with them. But the fact that the reactor can power not only the engine, but also many other units, or even use the entire TEM as a space power plant, speaks in favor of the electric propulsion engine.

A nuclear rocket engine is a rocket engine whose operating principle is based on a nuclear reaction or radioactive decay, which releases energy that heats the working fluid, which can be reaction products or some other substance, such as hydrogen.

Let's look at the options and principles from action...

There are several types of rocket engines that use the principle of operation described above: nuclear, radioisotope, thermonuclear. Using nuclear rocket engines, it is possible to obtain specific impulse values significantly higher than those that can be achieved by chemical rocket engines. High value specific impulse is explained by the high speed of outflow of the working fluid - about 8-50 km/s. The thrust force of a nuclear engine is comparable to that of chemical engines, which will make it possible in the future to replace all chemical engines with nuclear ones.

The main obstacle on the way complete replacement is radioactive contamination environment, which is caused by nuclear rocket engines.

They are divided into two types - solid and gas phase. In the first type of engines, fissile material is placed in rod assemblies with a developed surface. This allows you to effectively heat a gaseous working fluid, usually hydrogen acts as a working fluid. The exhaust speed is limited by the maximum temperature of the working fluid, which, in turn, directly depends on the maximum permissible temperature of the structural elements, and it does not exceed 3000 K. In gas-phase nuclear rocket engines, the fissile substance is in a gaseous state. Its retention in work area carried out through the influence of an electromagnetic field. For this type of nuclear rocket engines, the structural elements are not a limiting factor, so the exhaust speed of the working fluid can exceed 30 km/s. They can be used as first stage engines, despite the leakage of fissile material.

In the 70s XX century In the USA and the Soviet Union, nuclear rocket engines with fissile matter in the solid phase were actively tested. In the United States, a program was being developed to create an experimental nuclear rocket engine as part of the NERVA program.

The Americans developed a graphite reactor cooled by liquid hydrogen, which was heated, evaporated and ejected through a rocket nozzle. The choice of graphite was due to its temperature resistance. According to this project, the specific impulse of the resulting engine should have been twice as high as the corresponding figure characteristic of chemical engines, with a thrust of 1100 kN. The Nerva reactor was supposed to work as part of the third stage of the Saturn V launch vehicle, but due to the closure of the lunar program and the lack of other tasks for rocket engines of this class, the reactor was never tested in practice.

A gas-phase nuclear rocket engine is currently in the theoretical development stage. A gas-phase nuclear engine involves using plutonium, whose slow-moving gas stream is surrounded by a faster flow of cooling hydrogen. On orbital space stations MIR and ISS conducted experiments that could give impetus to the further development of gas-phase engines.

Today we can say that Russia has slightly “frozen” its research in the field of nuclear propulsion systems. The work of Russian scientists is more focused on the development and improvement of basic components and assemblies of nuclear power plants, as well as their unification. The priority direction for further research in this area is the creation of nuclear power propulsion systems capable of operating in two modes. The first is the nuclear rocket engine mode, and the second is the installation mode of generating electricity to power the equipment installed on board the spacecraft.

The statement made by Vladimir Putin during his address to the Federal Assembly about the presence in Russia of a cruise missile driven by a nuclear engine caused a storm of excitement in society and the media. At the same time, until recently, quite little was known to both the general public and specialists about what such an engine is and the possibilities of its use.

"Reedus" tried to figure out what technical device the president could speak and what made him unique.

Considering that the presentation in the Manege was not made for an audience of technical specialists, but for the “general” public, its authors could have allowed a certain substitution of concepts, Georgiy Tikhomirov, deputy director of the Institute of Nuclear Physics and Technology of the National Research Nuclear University MEPhI, does not rule out.

“What the president said and showed, experts call compact power plants, experiments with which were carried out initially in aviation, and then in deep space exploration. These were attempts to solve the insoluble problem of a sufficient supply of fuel when flying over unlimited distances. In this sense, the presentation is completely correct: the presence of such an engine ensures an arbitrary power supply for the systems of a rocket or any other device for a long time" he told Reedus.

Work with such an engine in the USSR began exactly 60 years ago under the leadership of academicians M. Keldysh, I. Kurchatov and S. Korolev. In the same years, similar work was carried out in the USA, but was discontinued in 1965. In the USSR, work continued for about another decade before it was also considered irrelevant. Perhaps that’s why Washington didn’t react too much, declaring that they were not surprised by the presentation of the Russian missile.

In Russia, the idea of a nuclear engine has never died - in particular, since 2009, the practical development of such a plant has been underway. Judging by the timing, the tests announced by the president fit perfectly into this joint project of Roscosmos and Rosatom - since the developers planned to conduct field tests of the engine in 2018. Possibly due to political reasons They pushed themselves a little harder and moved the deadlines “to the left.”

“Technologically, it is designed in such a way that the nuclear power unit heats the gas coolant. And this heated gas either rotates the turbine or creates jet thrust directly. A certain cunning in the presentation of the rocket that we heard is that its flight range is not infinite: it is limited by the volume of the working fluid - liquid gas, which can physically be pumped into the rocket tanks,” says the specialist.

At the same time, space rocket and a cruise missile have fundamentally different flight control schemes, since they have different tasks. The first flies in airless space, it does not need to maneuver - it is enough to give it an initial impulse, and then it moves along the calculated ballistic trajectory.

A cruise missile, on the other hand, must continuously change its trajectory, for which it must have a sufficient supply of fuel to create impulses. Whether this fuel will be ignited by a nuclear power plant or a traditional one is not important in this case. The only thing that matters is the supply of this fuel, Tikhomirov emphasizes.

“The meaning of a nuclear installation when flying into deep space is the presence on board of an energy source to power the systems of the device for an unlimited time. In this case, there may be not only a nuclear reactor, but also radioisotope thermoelectric generators. But the meaning of such an installation on a rocket, the flight of which will not last more than a few tens of minutes, is not yet entirely clear to me,” the physicist admits.

The Manege report was only a couple of weeks late compared to NASA's statement on February 15 that the Americans were resuming research work on a nuclear rocket engine, which they abandoned half a century ago.

By the way, in November 2017, the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) announced that a nuclear-powered spacecraft would be created in China by 2045. Therefore, today we can safely say that the global nuclear propulsion race has begun.

A rocket engine in which the working fluid is either a substance (for example, hydrogen) heated by the energy released during a nuclear reaction or radioactive decay, or directly the products of these reactions. Distinguish... ... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

nuclear rocket engine- branduolinis raketinis variklis statusas T sritis Gynyba apibrėžtis Raketinis variklis, kuriame reaktyvinė trauka sudaroma vykstant branduolinei arba termobranduolinei reakcijai. Branduoliniams raketiniams varikliams sudaroma kur kas didesnė… … Artilerijos terminų žodynas

- (Nuclear Jet) a rocket engine in which thrust is created due to the energy released during radioactive decay or a nuclear reaction. According to the type of nuclear reaction occurring in the nuclear engine, a radioisotope rocket engine is distinguished... ...

- (YARD) rocket engine, in which the source of energy is nuclear fuel. In a nuclear powered engine with a nuclear reactor. The torus heat released as a result of a nuclear chain reaction is transferred to the working fluid (for example, hydrogen). Nuclear reactor core... ...

This article should be Wikified. Please format it according to the article formatting rules. Nuclear rocket engine using a homogeneous solution of nuclear fuel salts (English... Wikipedia

Nuclear rocket engine (NRE) is a type of rocket engine that uses the energy of fission or fusion of nuclei to create jet thrust. They are actually reactive (heating the working fluid in a nuclear reactor and releasing gas through... ... Wikipedia

A jet engine, the energy source and working fluid of which is located in the vehicle itself. The rocket engine is the only one practically mastered for launching a payload into orbit of an artificial Earth satellite and for use in ... ... Wikipedia

- (RD) A jet engine that uses for its operation only substances and energy sources available in reserve on a moving vehicle (aircraft, ground, underwater). Thus, unlike air-jet engines (See... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Isotopic rocket engine, a nuclear rocket engine that uses the decay energy of radioactive isotopes of chemicals. elements. This energy serves to heat the working fluid, or the working fluid is the decomposition products themselves, forming... ... Big Encyclopedic Polytechnic Dictionary

Be careful there are a lot of letters.

A flight prototype of a spacecraft with a nuclear propulsion system (NPP) is planned to be created in Russia by 2025. The corresponding work is included in the draft Federal Space Program for 2016–2025 (FKP-25), sent by Roscosmos for approval to the ministries.

Nuclear systems Electricity is considered the main promising source of energy in space when planning large-scale interplanetary expeditions. In the future, the nuclear power plant, which is currently being created by Rosatom enterprises, will be able to provide megawatt power in space.

All work on the creation of a nuclear power plant is proceeding in accordance with the planned deadlines. We can with a large share confidence to say that the work will be completed on time target program, says Andrey Ivanov, project manager of the communications department of the state corporation Rosatom.

Recently, the project has completed two important stages: a unique design of the fuel element has been created, ensuring operability under conditions of high temperatures, large temperature gradients, and high-dose radiation. Technological tests of the reactor vessel of the future space power unit have also been successfully completed. As part of these tests, the housing was subjected to overpressure and 3D measurements were taken in the base metal, circumferential weld and tapered transition areas.

Operating principle. History of creation.

WITH nuclear reactor There are no fundamental difficulties for space applications. In the period from 1962 to 1993, our country accumulated a wealth of experience in the production of similar installations. Similar work was carried out in the USA. Since the early 1960s, several types of electric propulsion engines have been developed in the world: ion, stationary plasma, anode layer engine, pulsed plasma engine, magnetoplasma, magnetoplasmodynamic.

Work on creating nuclear engines for spacecraft was actively carried out in the USSR and the USA in the last century: the Americans closed the project in 1994, the USSR - in 1988. The closure of work was largely facilitated by the Chernobyl disaster, which negatively affected public opinion regarding use nuclear energy. In addition, tests of nuclear installations in space did not always proceed as planned: in 1978, the Soviet satellite Kosmos-954 entered the atmosphere and disintegrated, scattering thousands of radioactive fragments over an area of 100 thousand square meters. km in northwestern Canada. Soviet Union paid Canada monetary compensation in the amount of more than $10 million.

In May 1988, two organizations - the Federation of American Scientists and the Committee of Soviet Scientists for Peace Against the Nuclear Threat - made a joint proposal to ban the use of nuclear energy in space. That proposal did not receive formal consequences, but since then no country has launched spacecraft with nuclear power plants on board.

The great advantages of the project are practically important operational characteristics - long service life (10 years of operation), significant overhaul interval and for a long time work on one switch.

In 2010, technical proposals for the project were formulated. Design began this year.

The nuclear power plant contains three main devices: 1) a reactor installation with a working fluid and auxiliary devices (heat exchanger-recuperator and turbogenerator-compressor); 2) electric rocket propulsion system; 3) refrigerator-emitter.

Reactor.

From a physical point of view, this is a compact gas-cooled fast neutron reactor.
The fuel used is a compound (dioxide or carbonitride) of uranium, but since the design must be very compact, the uranium has a higher enrichment in the 235 isotope than in conventional (civilian) fuel rods. nuclear power plants perhaps higher than 20%. And their shell is a monocrystalline alloy of refractory metals based on molybdenum.

This fuel will have to work at very high temperatures. Therefore, it was necessary to choose materials that could contain negative factors, associated with temperature, and at the same time allow the fuel to perform its main function - to heat the gas coolant, with the help of which electricity will be produced.

Fridge.

Cooling of gas during the operation of a nuclear installation is absolutely necessary. How to dump heat into outer space? The only possibility is cooling by radiation. The heated surface in the void cools, radiating electromagnetic waves in a wide range, including visible light. The uniqueness of the project is the use of a special coolant - a helium-xenon mixture. The installation ensures a high efficiency.

Engine.

The operating principle of the ion engine is as follows. In the gas-discharge chamber, a rarefied plasma is created using anodes and a cathode block located in a magnetic field. From it, the ions of the working fluid (xenon or other substance) are “pulled” by the emission electrode and accelerated in the gap between it and the accelerating electrode.

To implement the plan, 17 billion rubles were promised between 2010 and 2018. Of these funds, 7.245 billion rubles were intended for the Rosatom state corporation to create the reactor itself. Another 3.955 billion - FSUE "Keldysh Center" for the creation of a nuclear power propulsion plant. Another 5.8 billion rubles will go to RSC Energia, where, within the same time frame, the working appearance of the entire transport and energy module will have to be formed.

According to plans, by the end of 2017, a nuclear power propulsion system will be prepared to complete the transport and energy module (interplanetary transfer module). By the end of 2018, the nuclear power plant will be prepared for flight tests. The project is financed from the federal budget.

It is no secret that work on the creation of nuclear rocket engines began in the USA and the USSR back in the 60s of the last century. How far have they come? And what problems did you encounter along the way?

Anatoly Koroteev: Indeed, work on the use of nuclear energy in space was started and actively carried out here and in the USA in the 1960-70s.

Initially, the task was set to create rocket engines that, instead of the chemical energy of combustion of fuel and oxidizer, would use heating of hydrogen to a temperature of about 3000 degrees. But it turned out that such a direct path was still ineffective. We are on short time We get high thrust, but at the same time we emit a jet, which in the event of abnormal operation of the reactor may turn out to be radioactively contaminated.

Some experience was accumulated, but neither we nor the Americans were able to create reliable engines. They worked, but not much, because heating hydrogen to 3000 degrees in a nuclear reactor is a serious task. In addition, environmental problems arose during ground tests of such engines, since radioactive jets were released into the atmosphere. It is no longer a secret that such work was carried out at the Semipalatinsk test site, specially prepared for nuclear testing, which remained in Kazakhstan.

That is, two parameters turned out to be critical - extreme temperature and radiation emissions?

Anatoly Koroteev: In general, yes. Due to these and some other reasons, work in our country and in the USA was stopped or suspended - this can be assessed in different ways. And renew them in such a, I would say, head-on manner as to make nuclear engine with all the already mentioned shortcomings, it seemed unreasonable to us. We proposed a completely different approach. It differs from the old one in the same way that a hybrid car differs from a regular one. In a regular car, the engine turns the wheels, but in hybrid cars, electricity is generated from the engine, and this electricity turns the wheels. That is, some kind of intermediate power station is being created.

So we proposed a scheme in which the space reactor does not heat the jet ejected from it, but generates electricity. Hot gas from the reactor turns the turbine, the turbine turns the electric generator and the compressor, which circulates the working fluid in a closed loop. The generator produces electricity for plasma engine with a specific thrust 20 times higher than that of chemical analogues.

Tricky scheme. Essentially, this is a mini-nuclear power plant in space. And what are its advantages over a ramjet nuclear engine?

Anatoly Koroteev: The main thing is that the jet coming out of the new engine will not be radioactive, since a completely different working fluid passes through the reactor, which is contained in a closed circuit.

In addition, with this scheme we do not need to heat hydrogen to prohibitive values: an inert working fluid circulates in the reactor, which heats up to 1500 degrees. We're making things really easy for ourselves. And as a result, we will increase the specific thrust not by two times, but by 20 times compared to chemical engines.

Another thing is also important: there is no need for complex full-scale tests, which require the infrastructure of the former Semipalatinsk test site, in particular, the test bench base that remains in the city of Kurchatov.

In our case, all the necessary tests can be carried out on Russian territory, without being drawn into long international negotiations on the use of nuclear energy outside the borders of one’s own state.

Is similar work currently underway in other countries?

Anatoly Koroteev: I had a meeting with the deputy head of NASA, we discussed issues related to returning to work on nuclear energy in space, and he said that the Americans are showing great interest in this.

It is quite possible that China may respond active actions for our part, so we need to work quickly. And not just for the sake of being half a step ahead of someone.

We need to work quickly, first of all, so that we look decent in the emerging international cooperation, and de facto it is being formed.

I do not rule out that in the near future an international program for a nuclear space power plant, similar to the controlled thermonuclear fusion program currently being implemented, may be initiated.