For Interplanetary travel what type of Fuel techology or power should we use travel safe and efficiently?

Question

Say you needed to transport Terraforming supplies to mars and it is a very large ship, so Nuclear power? Ionic Engines? Solar Sails? Solar Power? A combination of those technologies?

Answer 1

Probably a solar powered ionic engine, or a solar sail, using current technology.

I'm developing a matter/anti-matter drive though, and that'll be the way to go if I can get it to work.

Orion

Answer 2

It is possible to land supplies on Mars using the same heavy lifters (Saturn Vs)that were used for the Moon missions 37 years ago. Unfortunately the people that built them have mostly retired and I heard that some of the plans have been lost.

Perhaps some of the Russian heavy launchers could be used. They were cheaper since they burned jet fuel rather than hydrogen.

Both American and Russian launchers were/are perfectly capable of attaining the needed velocities to reach Mars within about 8 months using a well thought out flight plan. In fact they were so powerful that the Apollo missions had to do quite a bit of slowing down on their way to the Moon

The main thing is to rid yourself of the idea that a Mars expedition must be all aboard one large ship. Send supplies first with two or three launches, then send your manned vehicles when it is confirmed that the supplies have arrived safely. There is no practical way to send very large quantities of stuff to Mars and any development there must be done with local resources since the biggest energy drain is getting the stuff off the Earth.

If you care to invent a cheap star gate, all that would change.

Answer 3

No single technology would be appropriate. Chemical rockets are best suited for lifting materials into earth orbit, but other technologies would work better for the interplanetary jump. To ever achieve passage in a reasonable time, we will need to use thermonuclear power. But we haven't the slightest idea how to do that.

Answer 4

Interplanetary return and forth indoors of our own image voltaic kit is amazingly available quite, as we've already executed so with robotic spacecraft. As for sending human beings to diverse planets, it rather is available, yet very impractical as we don't yet have the technological purposes of bobbing up quicker spaceships that should shrink the time it takes to get someplace. A one way trip to mars with present day technologies can take around 6 months, and that's just to our neighbour. As for quicker-than-delicate return and forth, there are in difficulty-unfastened words theories and optimal of them are organic and organic technological understand-how fiction. this is going to in all risk be rather it sluggish interior the previous we make a flow to to mars and particular centuries till at last we land on the 1st exoplanet. So on a similar time via fact it ought to look impossible and extremely impractical on the instant, 200 years style now must be very different.

Answer 5

Fuel cells, or some type of reactor to produce electrical energy for ion propulsion. If there have been sufficient material advances to reduce erosion effects, then expansion thrust by a gas, or water such as was being tested in Project Kiwi would also work.

Answer 6

Anything other than rocket engines. Rocket propulsion is very expensive compared to other technologies. Right now though, it is the most tested technology that we have and easiest to implement. Hopefully this will change significantly in the future.

Answer 7

Solar, when harnessed to its maximum potential it will be the most logical and economic choice.

Answer 8

semen by the bucket load. i have already started to hoard. off my brothers