Abstract Reliable electrical power is needed for space exploration and development, including supporting human outposts on the surface of the Moon, Mars, asteroid mining, and other applications, and this power could be provided by micro nuclear reactors designed to operate for a decade or more in such remote locations and extreme environments. Based on anticipated near-term needs for a Moon outpost, it is expected that the design and performance targets for a space micro-reactor will be to provide 100-kWe for 10 years, and to have a total mass (core + reflector + shield) that is below 3,000 kg, to accommodate the additional mass of secondary systems (power converter, radiators, and other components), and limitations for launch and Moon landing vehicles. Exploratory scoping studies have been carried out using the SERPENT reactor physics analysis code for a simplified homogeneous model to evaluate the performance characteristics of a potential thermal-spectrum space micro-reactor concept with a nominal power level of 500 kWth / 100 kWe, using the early SNAP-8 space reactor design as a guide. A reference design concept (50-cm diameter, 100-cm height) has been developed, and permutations and modifications to that concept have been tested, using different combinations of fuel, coolant, moderator, and reflector materials. As a simplifying approximation, the core materials are homogenized for the computational reactor physics modeling with SERPENT to evaluate impacts of design permutations on the core operation life and total system mass (core + reflector + shield).
Wojtaszek et al. (Wed,) studied this question.