The Nuclear Rocket that Could Reach 20% of the Speed of Light

[alberto91]

In 2009, the same society together with the Tau Zero Foundation announced Project Icarus, a similar spacecraft that could achieve 15% the speed of light.

That year, a physicist called Friedwardt Winterberg announced a fusion spacecraft that could be used as a capacitor to produce proton beams that would ignite deuterium micro-bombs. However, this technology would have to be constructed in space and the cost would be too expensive. For this reason, Winterberg proposes that the nuclear fuel could be ignited by Marx generators.

In this line, Chief Scientist of Icarus Interstellar Adam Crowl has suggested that a two stage-configuration of the Winterberg rocket could achieve 20% the speed of light. The starship would weigh 120,000 tons, and the amount of deuterium needed would be 12,000,000 tons. It would only take around 20 years to reach the closest potentially habitable exoplanet, Proxima b.

Source: Considering that the first nuclear fusion rocket could be ready for launch by 2028, how plausible do you think this nuclear rocket design is?

 

[StandardsGuy]

It sounds humongously expensive, but the government has lots of money. I would need to know if communication would be possible all the way there. Pictures would be necessary to have any value at all from this. The chances of finding life this way on another star system is very very slim.

 

[anorlunda]

The video gives zero scientific information to comment on. Unless you have a peer reviewed paper to reference, we have to consider it unsubstantiated claims.

 

[member 656954]

The video gives zero scientific information to comment on. Unless you have a peer reviewed paper to reference, we have to consider it unsubstantiated claims.

There are many papers referenced on the project website, but it is not clear which exactly relate to the specific content in the video. For example, this paper describes travel times per stage, as well as fuel consumption, but seems entirely presumptive regarding the method of propulsion, whereas this one focuses on a propulsion system in more detail.

While the project papers referenced seem scientifically valid, the engineering is essentially science fiction!

 

[trurle]

In 2009, the same society together with the Tau Zero Foundation announced Project Icarus, a similar spacecraft that could achieve 15% the speed of light.

That year, a physicist called Friedwardt Winterberg announced a fusion spacecraft that could be used as a capacitor to produce proton beams that would ignite deuterium micro-bombs. However, this technology would have to be constructed in space and the cost would be too expensive. For this reason, Winterberg proposes that the nuclear fuel could be ignited by Marx generators.

In this line, Chief Scientist of Icarus Interstellar Adam Crowl has suggested that a two stage-configuration of the Winterberg rocket could achieve 20% the speed of light. The starship would weigh 120,000 tons, and the amount of deuterium needed would be 12,000,000 tons. It would only take around 20 years to reach the closest potentially habitable exoplanet, Proxima b.

Source: Considering that the first nuclear fusion rocket could be ready for launch by 2028, how plausible do you think this nuclear rocket design is?

The design asks to launch to space an equivalent of 15,000 years of modern world space launch capacity, and rely on technologies currently on concept level. Well, it would take 600 years assuming current energy handling progress of 2% per year maintained and no unforeseen obstacles.

 

[mfb]

Considering that the first nuclear fusion rocket could be ready for launch by 2028

It can't. We can't even do what they propose on Earth, without strict mass constraints, and I predict we won't be able to do that in 2028 either. You need a long list of miracles for this to work:

• Increase the laser shot rate from a few per day (NIF) to at least 100 per second
• Reduce the mass of the overall laser system by orders of magnitude
• Improve the efficiency of the laser system by orders of magnitude
• Increase the fusion yield by orders of magnitude
• Get a compact nuclear reactor running to power the lasers (fusion as well?)
• Find a way to get rid of all the excess heat - in space
• Assemble all that to a spacecraft design
• Produce a giant amount of tritium or He-3, unless you manage to get all of the above running for DD fusion (which would be an even larger miracle)
• Launch tens of thousands or even millions of tonnes to space

Out of that list, the last item might be plausible for 2028 if Starship becomes as reusable as claimed. Everything else? Forget it.
A smaller test spacecraft would only relax the last two items and maybe the first one. You still need the overall inertial confinement fusion to work, and currently it doesn't (in a useful way).

 

[Vanadium 50]

JWST is substantially less complex - for example, the technologies exist - and even it wasn't able to launch in 9 years. 2028 is fantasy.

 

[Nik_2213]

IIRC, the original Daedalus project proposed scoop-mining Jupiter's atmosphere for the necessary deuterium...

Sadly, pulsed-ignition is another fusion technology that continues to elude 'break even'...