US Military Eyes Tiny Nuclear Reactors for Deployed Troops

[Swordsmyth]

Getting fuel to remote operating bases is a big problem for the U.S. military. In 2008, during the height of combat in Iraq, the Government Accountability Office estimated that more than 900,000 gallons of fuel went to bases for basic power needs like lighting and refrigeration (on top of the 6.7 million gallons the military burned that year in jets and ground vehicles.) The U.S. military’s Strategic Capabilities Office has put out a request for information about small nuclear reactors that could deploy to the sorts of hillside forward bases U.S. troops set up in places like Afghanistan.
According to the request for “Project Dilithium,” the reactor should fit on a truck and a C-17 aircraft and generate from one to 10 megawatts of electric power for three years without refueling. Soldiers have to be able to stand it up in 72 hours and take it down in a week. It’s got to be meltdown-proof. The office is looking to fund three different prototype designs and will then select a winner from among them.

More at: https://www.defenseone.com/technolo...tiny-nuclear-reactors-deployed-troops/154406/

 

[timosman]

Estimated cost $1B per unit?

 

[XNavyNuke]

I read the RFI. I see the greenie weenies still have their lily pad in the swamp. The package is essentially the same as the SM-1's developed by the Army in the late 1950's, with the exception of mandating the use of LEU. For a military system the LEU requirement is stupid, if not a poison pill.

XNN

 

[TheTexan]

This would help greatly with deploying troops for extended periods of time all over the world.