[CPEO-MEF] PERCHLORATE, PREVENTION: NASA tests "Green" rocket propellant

[Lenny Siegel <lennysiegel@gmail.com>]

"Green" propellant could give rockets--and environment--a boost

By John Matson
Scientific American 60-Second Science Blog
August 27, 2009

        


A team from NASA, the military and academia has developed and tested a 
simple rocket fuel of fine-grained aluminum and water ice that the 
researchers say could provide a cleaner alternative to propellants now 
in use.

The propellant, known as ALICE (for aluminum and ice), showed its stuff 
by shooting a nine-foot test rocket a quarter of a mile into the sky 
this month, according to NASA.

Mitat Birkan, program manager for space power and propulsion at the U.S. 
Air Force Office of Scientific Research, one of the agencies working on 
the fuel, says that ALICE is more environmentally friendly, before and 
after burning, than conventional fuel. The only by-products of ALICE 
combustion, Birkan says, are gaseous hydrogen and relatively innocuous 
aluminum oxide.

...

For the entire article, see
http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=green-propellant-could-give-rockets-2009-08-27


--


Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org


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