There’s a manufacturing company on the cusp of big things in central Virginia. They’re developing nuclear rocket fuel for NASA.
BWXT Advanced Technologies is a leader in nuclear design and manufacturing. And some day that expertise may just help an astronaut make it to Mars. Amanda Greenlaw is excited to be in charge of that program.
“I think it’s the recognition of this type of program in Lynchburg, Virginia," Greenlaw says. "We’re not Huntsville, we’re not on the cape, right? Where you see more space programs. That’s a bigger industry.”
Since 2017, the company has been helping design a nuclear thermal propulsion system, or NTP, that operates on the same principles as a commercial nuclear reactor. But, instead of creating energy to turn on a light bulb, it will be to send a rocket into space.
“If you think of the reactor, it houses the nuclear fuel, the core, which behaves as the heat source for the system," Greenlaw explains. "In the case of an NTP rocket, gas flows through that system, picks up heat through the fission process, out the back of the nozzle producing thrust for the rocket.”
Although the logic of that system is fairly straightforward, the creation of it is not. It includes designing and making the fuel, particles the width of a hair containing uranium.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.
