Min-Mag Orion

[james_davis_nicoll]

This is old news but I don't think I ever mentioned it here.

I like this bit:

The resulting hot plasma is directed with a magnetic nozzle to achieve a specific impulse range of 7,500 to 25,000 seconds, at a yield per pulse of 100 to 30,000 GJ. At the upper range, that's about 2 1/2 times the amount of energy that the human race uses in one second (excluding poorly tracked solar inputs).



(Warning: pdf)

Comments

[space-parasite.livejournal.com]

30 000 GJ is 6 MT, right? So, a large nuke, but not an absurdly large one. (Okay, multiplied by the number of seconds in your boost phase, maybe not so small.)

[yorkshire-ranter.blogspot.com (from livejournal.com)]

But you can't deny that it would be fun.

[space-parasite.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't dream of it!

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

No, I think 1 MT is defined as about 4.184×10^15 J. 3x10^13 J would be about 7 kilotons, in the rough neighborhood of what was dropped in late 1945.

[space-parasite.livejournal.com]

Bah, you're right. It's 4ish TJ per kiloton. So, the conclusion to be drawn is not that the MMO uses absurd amounts of energy, but that humans are making poor use of the Earth's nuclear resources.