Reactor power for space exploration

Potential 21st century missions envisioned by National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) planners encompass ambitious, wide-ranging human and robotic solar system exploration objectives and scenarios. A critical common element in many of these future civil space mission initiatives is the ability to generate, with a very high degree of reliability, the considerable amounts of power needed to realize the mission goals. The extended duration and/or high power level requirements for many missions and, in instances, the lack of adequate solar energy flux for others, render the use of versatile nuclear power sources as either missions-enabling or very advantageous. Further, the use of high-performance reactor systems, when coupled with very high impulse electric propulsion systems, can enable or significantly enhance both human near-planets operations and robotic scientific missions to the very farthest reaches of the solar system. It is important that this nation continue to develop the means of acquiring a space reactor power source to ensure availability at such time that approved missions and possibly political considerations warrant its use