JIMO and more?

Jupiter Icy Moon Orbiter is a proposed mission using a nuclear reactor
to travel via nuclear electric propulsion to orbit jupiter and be able
to travel between the three outer moons of Jupiter.

Question: what would be the marginal cost(s) of building not one
craft, but four (Saturn Icy moon Orbiter, Uranus Icy Moon Orbiter and
Neptune Icy Moon Orbiter) with specialized series' of landers on each?

the big tech issue is full scale working reactors and electric
propulsion on this scale. are these show stoppers? and for once,
electricity supply won't be a truly limiting factor

look at this link

http://www.space.com/businesstechnol...te_041210.html

the only mission on the competing list that holds any "gee whiz"
factor for me is the NEO robot exploration option. even so, that's
like a hobby mission compared to the scope and breadth of a JIMO-like
fleet....


comments? any of you space policy wonks out there?

In article , Beavith wrote:
Question: what would be the marginal cost(s) of building not one
craft, but four (Saturn Icy moon Orbiter, Uranus Icy Moon Orbiter and
Neptune Icy Moon Orbiter) with specialized series' of landers on each?

Interesting idea. "Discovery" (the so-called
faster-better-cheaper concept) chassis with bolt-on landers and possibly
tweaked science packages. Worth thinking about.
The difficult bit is going to be getting people to accept putting
nuclear reactors in space; some people will object because of "Chicken
Little" style fears (they're the ones who forget that we're riding on a
fission-powered nuclear reactor around a fusion-powered reactor), others
will object to this because the US military want to get nuclear-powered
weapons into orbit. In short, the political costs are likely to be
greater than the engineering ones.

--
Aidan Karley,
Aberdeen, Scotland,
Location: 57°10'11" N, 02°08'43" W (sub-tropical Aberdeen), 0.021233

On Tue, 18 Jan 2005 22:00:04 GMT, Aidan Karley
wrote:

In article , Beavith wrote:
Question: what would be the marginal cost(s) of building not one
craft, but four (Saturn Icy moon Orbiter, Uranus Icy Moon Orbiter and
Neptune Icy Moon Orbiter) with specialized series' of landers on each?

Interesting idea. "Discovery" (the so-called
faster-better-cheaper concept) chassis with bolt-on landers and possibly
tweaked science packages. Worth thinking about.

this wouldn't be Discovery style. JIMO is clean sheet of paper
engineering.
i'm more concerned about "if we build one, why not build four." bolt
on landers? excellent!

The difficult bit is going to be getting people to accept putting
nuclear reactors in space; some people will object because of "Chicken
Little" style fears (they're the ones who forget that we're riding on a
fission-powered nuclear reactor around a fusion-powered reactor),

isn't that the truth...

others
will object to this because the US military want to get nuclear-powered
weapons into orbit.

this would be news. the russians have had reactors in orbit for years
and i think the US has merely dabbled in it.

In short, the political costs are likely to be
greater than the engineering ones.


the hue and cry over Cassini when it launched was fueled by Chernobyl
and Three Mile Island anti nukes.

you must be seeing these kind of people where you live. aren't you in
the vicinity of the UK's nuclear reprocessing facility? could this be
a case where the Pu in your blood has you overly concerned?

(just kidding - we all have fallout form the 50's and 60's in our
bodies. just for yucks, get a gieger counter and check out wood fire
ashes. its pretty amazing.)

seriously. reactor powered probes for outer planet exploration is
pretty much the only way to go. RTG's don't scale up that big.

In article , Beavith wrote:
the hue and cry over Cassini when it launched was fueled by Chernobyl
and Three Mile Island anti nukes.

you must be seeing these kind of people where you live. aren't you in
the vicinity of the UK's nuclear reprocessing facility? could this be
a case where the Pu in your blood has you overly concerned?

I'm about 300 miles from it, in the (arguably) most radioactive
city in Britain, on the opposite coast from the main reprocessing plant.
In the early 1990s I was trying to get work on the geotechnics for the
nuclear storage facility at Seascale/ Sellafield/ Windscale/ Calder Hall
(they change the name after each major incident).
I use a phial of undepleted uranium salts to make my home brew's
yeast experience a more mutagenic environment, to breed in more alcohol
tolerance in the little eukaryotes.
I have a healthy but realistic respect for the risks of
radiation.

just for yucks, get a gieger counter and check out wood fire
ashes. its pretty amazing.

The potassium in the pot ashes, I'd guess. I think I'll have to
get hold of the Geology Department's lump of Quaaqortogite (spelling?);
if you think pot ashes are for yuks, you'll split your sides over the
counter reading on that stuff.

seriously. reactor powered probes for outer planet exploration is
pretty much the only way to go. RTG's don't scale up that big.

You don't need to persuade me of that. It's a political issue,
not a technical one.

Where would I put a UK nuclear waste storage facility? Under the
Houses of Parliament. Technically, it's as good (or as bad) as anywhere
else that's been suggested, and it's got the guarantee that the
politicians will remember to not let the thing leak.

--
Aidan Karley,
Aberdeen, Scotland,
Location: 57°10'11" N, 02°08'43" W (sub-tropical Aberdeen), 0.021233

On Wed, 19 Jan 2005 22:00:08 GMT, Aidan Karley
wrote:

In article , Beavith wrote:
the hue and cry over Cassini when it launched was fueled by Chernobyl
and Three Mile Island anti nukes.

you must be seeing these kind of people where you live. aren't you in
the vicinity of the UK's nuclear reprocessing facility? could this be
a case where the Pu in your blood has you overly concerned?

I'm about 300 miles from it, in the (arguably) most radioactive
city in Britain, on the opposite coast from the main reprocessing plant.
In the early 1990s I was trying to get work on the geotechnics for the
nuclear storage facility at Seascale/ Sellafield/ Windscale/ Calder Hall
(they change the name after each major incident).

ouch.

I use a phial of undepleted uranium salts to make my home brew's
yeast experience a more mutagenic environment, to breed in more alcohol
tolerance in the little eukaryotes.

that's "vial" you heathen.
i pity the poor fools (the yeast)...

I have a healthy but realistic respect for the risks of
radiation.

just for yucks, get a gieger counter and check out wood fire
ashes. its pretty amazing.

The potassium in the pot ashes, I'd guess.

i wish i had the reference. apparently its the quite small amount of
longer lived fallout isotopes (Sr, Cs) that have blown around the
world. i do imagine K offers a contribution

I think I'll have to
get hold of the Geology Department's lump of Quaaqortogite (spelling?);
if you think pot ashes are for yuks, you'll split your sides over the
counter reading on that stuff.

ha ha ha .....

seriously. reactor powered probes for outer planet exploration is
pretty much the only way to go. RTG's don't scale up that big.

You don't need to persuade me of that. It's a political issue,
not a technical one.

absolutely.

Where would I put a UK nuclear waste storage facility? Under the
Houses of Parliament. Technically, it's as good (or as bad) as anywhere
else that's been suggested, and it's got the guarantee that the
politicians will remember to not let the thing leak.


heh heh.
not that i've been paying attention, but i thought there was some
discussion of a hi level storage facility on the continent?
talk about political.. you would think that a next generation reactor
would have some capacity to burn waste.

In article , Beavith wrote:
not that i've been paying attention, but i thought there was some
discussion of a hi level storage facility on the continent?
talk about political.

There's a general principle that you clean up your own ****.
That implies a HLW facility in each country. Politicians are still
arguing with "nimby"s ("Not In My Back Yard"s), and probably will do
for centuries to come.

--
Aidan Karley,
Aberdeen, Scotland,
Location: 57°10'11" N, 02°08'43" W (sub-tropical Aberdeen), 0.021233

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 10:00:10 GMT, Aidan Karley
wrote:

In article , Beavith wrote:
not that i've been paying attention, but i thought there was some
discussion of a hi level storage facility on the continent?
talk about political.

There's a general principle that you clean up your own ****.

and a relatively recent principle at that. although i can remember my
mother throwing a shoe at me and telling me to pick up my mess...

That implies a HLW facility in each country. Politicians are still
arguing with "nimby"s ("Not In My Back Yard"s), and probably will do
for centuries to come.

maybe decades, but time is getting short. do euro nuke plants have a
cooling pond on site? US plants do, and they are reaching capacity
now. there's no evidence that our Nevada site will ever open, thanks
to our nimbys, and even if it does, it'll take decades to process all
the bad stuff we have already.

that's why i hope for a next generation commercial nuke plant that has
the capacity to burn hi level wastes

In article , Beavith wrote:
but time is getting short. do euro nuke plants have a
cooling pond on site? US plants do,

There are a number of different designs out, but I think most
have medium-term storage on site. Some may be wet stores, some dry,
depends on lots of things.

there's no evidence that our Nevada site will ever open, thanks
to our nimbys, and even if it does, it'll take decades to process all
the bad stuff we have already.

Yucca mountain? That's a *storage* depot, not a reprocessing
facility AFAIK.

--
Aidan Karley,
Aberdeen, Scotland,
Location: 57°10'11" N, 02°08'43" W (sub-tropical Aberdeen), 0.021233

This is becoming a hot topic indeed... I guess Prometheus will still be
a rapidly evolving technology, even at the time when JIMO is launched
(despite it's actually based on existing systems). The same relates to
ion engines. The best candidate for a loud post-JIMO mission is
probably the one to Neptune, carrying a bunch of droids to it and to
Triton: http://www.spacedaily.com/news/outerplanets-04m.html

Well, Boeing states they can do it all. They'll barely do it all at
once, though. See also some funny articles at nuclearspace.com.

On Sat, 22 Jan 2005 10:00:09 GMT, Aidan Karley
wrote:

In article , Beavith wrote:
but time is getting short. do euro nuke plants have a
cooling pond on site? US plants do,

There are a number of different designs out, but I think most
have medium-term storage on site. Some may be wet stores, some dry,
depends on lots of things.

there's no evidence that our Nevada site will ever open, thanks
to our nimbys, and even if it does, it'll take decades to process all
the bad stuff we have already.

Yucca mountain? That's a *storage* depot, not a reprocessing
facility AFAIK.

storage for the processed waste. for instance, no liquids and, i
believe processed into glass logs.