Faster, higher, deadlier: US plans nuclear drones
04-02-2012, 01:30 PM
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Faster, higher, deadlier: US plans nuclear drones
http://rt.com/news/us-plans-nuclear-drones-058/
The United States is planning on building nuclear-powered drones. The innovation will allow an increase in flying time "from days to months," leaving more power available for operating equipment.
Research for the project was conducted by Sandia National Laboratories, the US government's principal nuclear research and development agency, and defense contractor Northrop Grumman, the Guardian reports.
The technology is to deal with three problems facing the US’ current drone arsenal: insufficient flying time over a potential target, lack of power for running surveillance and weapons systems, and lack of communications capacity.
The team looked at numerous different power systems for large- and medium-sized drones before settling on the nuclear solution.
The research summary deems the technology as highly efficient, saying the results of the research are “to be used in the next generation of unmanned air vehicles used for military and intelligence applications."
However, there is a big concern over safety as drones have a tendency to crash – and should a nuclear-powered drone fall into the hands of terrorists or unfriendly powers, the consequences could be devastating.
I dont see this going over well. What happens if one of these crashes in a village or city somewhere over seas?
The United States is planning on building nuclear-powered drones. The innovation will allow an increase in flying time "from days to months," leaving more power available for operating equipment.
Research for the project was conducted by Sandia National Laboratories, the US government's principal nuclear research and development agency, and defense contractor Northrop Grumman, the Guardian reports.
The technology is to deal with three problems facing the US’ current drone arsenal: insufficient flying time over a potential target, lack of power for running surveillance and weapons systems, and lack of communications capacity.
The team looked at numerous different power systems for large- and medium-sized drones before settling on the nuclear solution.
The research summary deems the technology as highly efficient, saying the results of the research are “to be used in the next generation of unmanned air vehicles used for military and intelligence applications."
However, there is a big concern over safety as drones have a tendency to crash – and should a nuclear-powered drone fall into the hands of terrorists or unfriendly powers, the consequences could be devastating.
I dont see this going over well. What happens if one of these crashes in a village or city somewhere over seas?
04-02-2012, 04:53 PM
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How exactly do they harness nuclear power as a means of propulsion?
The last I heard of that was nuclear pulse drive... where you push a space craft along with lots of small nuclear explosions. Yikes.
The last I heard of that was nuclear pulse drive... where you push a space craft along with lots of small nuclear explosions. Yikes.
04-02-2012, 08:24 PM
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What, nuclear reactors? Have a history of NOT failing because the people (in the Western world anyway) who run them are waaaaaay strict on design and maintenance being done right.
Nuclear energy makes heat. Heat warms fluid. Fluid moves stuff. You can put nuclear power in anything, except then the watermelons in Congress and the EPA will cut your throat if the oil companies don't get to you first.
Nuclear energy makes heat. Heat warms fluid. Fluid moves stuff. You can put nuclear power in anything, except then the watermelons in Congress and the EPA will cut your throat if the oil companies don't get to you first.
04-03-2012, 09:57 AM
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+1 to that.
Compare deaths due to coal power against deaths due to nuclear power - and that is even when you correct for the fact that there are less nuclear power plants around!
Compare deaths due to coal power against deaths due to nuclear power - and that is even when you correct for the fact that there are less nuclear power plants around!
04-03-2012, 06:04 PM
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nuclear is badly misunderstood. sigh....don't get me started on this topic unless you want to talk for hours on end!!
i'll never say its perfect, just the best choice we have at the moment. in my opinion our research should be going into figuring out how to harness more energy from the spent fuel...for example, light water reactors use enriched uranium. but the fuel in there. reprocess as needed, dump it into a CANDU or other heavy water reactor and burn it up further. after that, we should dump the remains in a sodium moderated fast breeder (like what billy gates is working on) to finish the job off. reprocess like france does and start the cycle again. end of the day, your waste would sit around for maybe 500 years instead of thousands and we'd get a sh*t ton of energy out of it.
as far as these drones go....i'm more worried on what fuel they would use. due to size, i'm wondering if it would be highly enriched uranium. possibly close to weapons grade. i don't fancy the idea of some jerk shooting these down just to get the enriched uranium. there are other options though, such as thorium. still its the enrichment that worries me. not a smart idea.
i'll never say its perfect, just the best choice we have at the moment. in my opinion our research should be going into figuring out how to harness more energy from the spent fuel...for example, light water reactors use enriched uranium. but the fuel in there. reprocess as needed, dump it into a CANDU or other heavy water reactor and burn it up further. after that, we should dump the remains in a sodium moderated fast breeder (like what billy gates is working on) to finish the job off. reprocess like france does and start the cycle again. end of the day, your waste would sit around for maybe 500 years instead of thousands and we'd get a sh*t ton of energy out of it.
as far as these drones go....i'm more worried on what fuel they would use. due to size, i'm wondering if it would be highly enriched uranium. possibly close to weapons grade. i don't fancy the idea of some jerk shooting these down just to get the enriched uranium. there are other options though, such as thorium. still its the enrichment that worries me. not a smart idea.
04-03-2012, 06:45 PM
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Small arms isn't going to shoot down a UAV lol. The medium sized ones that can't even carry a 100lb hellfire fly at around 5-7k' and last a 5-7 hours, the large ones which this would most likely replace, which do fly days, fly at ~10-60k'. There really aren't many SA threats that can reach 10k+ let alone 20-60k' and if they had something that could, they would already have plenty or uranium or nuclear technology already.
And though they are showing a picture of a predator (which can barely loiter a day), since the article says days, it will most likely be used on the global hawks types, which loiters for a bit longer a day and is at altitudes 40k'+. And the predetor is a recon/bombing platform, the nuclear would most likely be strictly for recon, and on the global hawk types. Essentially these would be like satelites, but offer better resolution and sounds like it will be much cheaper in the long run.
And the little ones go down all the time, but the big ones, not so much. The medium ones have issues like a simple stuck throttle cable or servo failure or engine flameout or line of sight issues. Knowing what is is beinng used for they build them relativly cheap. But if they make nuclear powered UAVs, you better believe their will be much more redundancy and backups involved.
Though I guess it might not be a bad idea to put a few hellfires or 2000 pounders on this as with the nuclear power, it should be more than able to handle the weight. Be able to drop a bomb within 500km within a matter of minutes. Human survivabillity makes aircraft rediculously expensive and large, UAVs are definatly the future and a much much cheaper alternative.....for recon anyway, not so sure about using UAVs for CAS or transport.
And though they are showing a picture of a predator (which can barely loiter a day), since the article says days, it will most likely be used on the global hawks types, which loiters for a bit longer a day and is at altitudes 40k'+. And the predetor is a recon/bombing platform, the nuclear would most likely be strictly for recon, and on the global hawk types. Essentially these would be like satelites, but offer better resolution and sounds like it will be much cheaper in the long run.
And the little ones go down all the time, but the big ones, not so much. The medium ones have issues like a simple stuck throttle cable or servo failure or engine flameout or line of sight issues. Knowing what is is beinng used for they build them relativly cheap. But if they make nuclear powered UAVs, you better believe their will be much more redundancy and backups involved.
Though I guess it might not be a bad idea to put a few hellfires or 2000 pounders on this as with the nuclear power, it should be more than able to handle the weight. Be able to drop a bomb within 500km within a matter of minutes. Human survivabillity makes aircraft rediculously expensive and large, UAVs are definatly the future and a much much cheaper alternative.....for recon anyway, not so sure about using UAVs for CAS or transport.
04-04-2012, 03:42 PM
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even if just one comes down from mechanical breakdown. we're talking about someone getting their hands on enriched uranium, forget about the spread of contamination should the containment be broken in a crash. and yes i admit one could make a containment vessel that would survive most impacts...but weight is a huge concern for any aircraft. who decides how safe is safe enough?
people have thought of nuclear powered aircraft and other vehicles in the past, its not really that difficult. the ideas were all scrapped for one reason: its irresponsible.
people have thought of nuclear powered aircraft and other vehicles in the past, its not really that difficult. the ideas were all scrapped for one reason: its irresponsible.
04-04-2012, 10:32 PM
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news flash: it's 2012. You don't need highly enriched anything to have a nuclear reactor. You can almost use uranium ore like it comes out of the mine (almost, I said).
Bigger = worse: you can remote control a 747. And?
Bigger = worse: you can remote control a 747. And?