China builds nuclear power plant for use in space

 

China builds nuclear power plant for use in space

Image source : Such tv

China has developed a prototype nuclear power plant for use in space that could generate one megawatt of electricity.

It is also the most powerful space nuclear power plant ever produced to produce 100 times more electricity than the space nuclear power plant being built by the US space agency NASA. NASA aims to land its new nuclear power plant on the Moon by 2030.

The Chinese space nuclear power plant was discovered by the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post in a recent report by Beijing correspondent Stephen Chen. No further details are available about the nuclear power plant, as the Chinese government has kept most of the information about nuclear power plants secret in its space program.

However, it is clear that the purpose of this nuclear power plant is to provide long-term power to the proposed spacecraft that will be sent to the Moon, Mars, and distant planets.

Work on the project started in 2019 with funding from the Chinese government, and in recent days it has achieved the first milestone in the form of its first prototype.

This will be especially useful for situations and places where sunlight is very weak compared to the earth, or fluctuates so much over and over again that solar power cannot be relied upon.

China plans to send a large number of spacecraft to the other side of the Moon (which is always in the opposite direction to Earth) and to Mars, respectively, from 2023 to 2030. In addition, it has already announced the launch of the first manned flight to Mars by 2030.

The South China Morning Post reported, without revealing the identity of a Chinese nuclear scientist, that the technology had been "extraordinarily advanced" to allow the space nuclear power plant to produce more electricity in a smaller size.

It should be noted that so far all nuclear power plants built for space purposes have only been able to generate a few hundred watts of electricity, while most projects from 10kW to 300kW are still ongoing.

In this sense, it is the first space nuclear power plant in the world to produce one megawatt (1000 kW) of electricity.

Source: suchtv