nuclear powered rockets

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, sraj wrote:
>
> Lucio mentioned use of:
> nuclear-powered
> > fully-reusable launchers (now that the anti-nuclear green
movement
> > hopefully is starting to decline)
Don't count on it. In fact, it looks like the con servers are
about to self detonate.
As an ecologist, I will still fight tooth and nail to keep
Nuclear Rockets from being fired in atmosphere.

>
> ... Is such a rocket possible?
Very possible and well understood for theory.

I would have thought that it would be
> difficult to design a nuclear rocket for launch from Earth, due to
the huge
> energy requirement in a very short time.
I'm not sure what you are saying here, but the point I'd like to
make is, Nuclear powered rockets shouldn't be used in atmosphere,
and the energy requirements of such a system are irrelevant, because
nuclear power resolves almost any power requirement you could think
of.

>
> But nuclear powered rockets will be ideal for interplanetary
travel -
> preferably designed to use any material as 'reaction fuel'. Have
such
> rockets been conceptualized?
Yeah, and there are a whole lot of very different ways of nuclear
powering a rocket. Some are pretty sloppy and some are pretty clean.
Some use the nuclear energy potential right there at the ignition
chamber, and some use the nuclear power energy potential to drive
electrical or magnetic or microwave ignition systems. There are all
sorts of designs, theories, and the list goes on and on. I'm only an
amatuer rocket scientist, so I'm not good for deeper details.

>
> Selvaraj
>
> From: "Lucio de Souza Coelho"
> To:
> Sent: Wednesday, April 05, 2006 4:50 AM
> Subject: Re: [spacesettlers] Re: Future direction for Humanity?
(was
> DonDavisarticle)
>
> > On 4/4/06, Don Davis wrote:
> > (...)
> >> One day it is not impossible that there will be major wars
between
> >> the major countries on the South American continent. I recall
> >> Argentina working on nuclear technology, but I haven't kept up
on who
> >> down there are likely to get atomic weapons soon.
> >
> > I know nothing about the Argentinian nuclear program. However,
during
> > the military dictatorship that ruled Brazil from the 60's to the
80's,
> > nuclear technology advanced enormously here (our first nuclear
plants
> > are from that time) and there are clues that the military may
have
> > tested, or anyway planned to test, a-bombs.
> >
> > Anyhow, in our current political environment I don't see any
trend of
> > development of nukes across the continent. (Although in a vaguely
> > related issue there is a growing lobby for construction of more
> > nuclear plants, since our hydroelectricity is close to the limit
and
> > fossil fuels are a dead end.) However, if some day in the future
the
> > bomb becomes attractive, we have the technology for enriching
uranium,
> > so I don't think that much research would be needed. The atomic
genie
> > is out of the bottle not only here, but all over the world.
> >
> > (...)
> >> Space planes are apparantly impossible to refine to the point
of
> >> becoming a practical method of getting into space. Every new
project
> >> to create a space plane after the shuttle has died a miserable
death
> >> with only Buran actually being test flown, an ominous sign that
our
> >> abilities to invent as we need, as was factored into Project
Apollo,
> >> is in decline. Perhaps if the priority traditionally given to
military
> >> projects was given to a practical reusable spaceplane with no
regard
> >> to development costs it could be done. The pathalogical
draining of
> >> resources into the means for warmaking makes doing any other
major
> >> project that much more difficult.
> > (...)
> >
> > Thanks, you managed to get this thread closer to the topic of
this list!
> > :-)
> >
> > I think that chemical rockets have reached the practical limit of
> > technological advance, and that may exclude space planes.
> > Nevertheless, I think that there *are* advances still to be
explored
> > in cheap access to space, but I think that they pass for complete
> > paradigm shifts in either economic or technological principles.
> > Assembly-line rockets (preferably Big Dumb Busters), nuclear-
powered
> > fully-reusable launchers (now that the anti-nuclear green
movement
> > hopefully is starting to decline) or, who knows, if we are lucky
even