{"id":212320,"date":"2017-03-01T06:37:43","date_gmt":"2017-03-01T11:37:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/uncategorized\/darlington-power-plant-helps-fuel-nasas-space-exploration-ctv-news.php"},"modified":"2017-03-01T06:37:43","modified_gmt":"2017-03-01T11:37:43","slug":"darlington-power-plant-helps-fuel-nasas-space-exploration-ctv-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/space-exploration\/darlington-power-plant-helps-fuel-nasas-space-exploration-ctv-news.php","title":{"rendered":"Darlington power plant helps fuel NASA&#8217;s space exploration &#8211; CTV News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><p>    Rachael D'Amore, CTV Toronto  Published Tuesday, February 28, 2017 6:21PM  EST  Last Updated Tuesday, February 28, 2017 7:14PM  EST<\/p>\n<p>    A local nuclear plant is stepping up to ensure NASAs ongoing    exploration of deep space continues for years to come.  <\/p>\n<p>    CTV News Toronto has learned that the Darlington Nuclear    Generating Station in Clarington, Ont. will produce and harvest    Plutonium-238, a spacecraft fueling agent, for NASA.  <\/p>\n<p>    Ontario Power Generation (OPG) and its venture arm, Canadian    Nuclear Partners, have teamed up to fill the gap left after the    United States stopped producing the glowing oxide pellet back    in 1988.  <\/p>\n<p>    Since then, their main source of Plutonium-238 dwindled and,    aside from two remaining fuel packs, have practically dried up.  <\/p>\n<p>    Now, NASA is teaming up with OPGs nuclear facilities to    replenish their inventory and fuel their existing (and future)    fleet of space probes.  <\/p>\n<p>    Plutonium-238 acts like a battery to space craft. By emitting    steady heat through natural radioactive decay, it produces    electricity aboard the craft to fuel it and keep scientific    equipment warm enough to function in space.  <\/p>\n<p>    Space probes like the illustrious Voyager 1 -- which left Earth    more than 40 years ago to explore Jupiter and Saturn and now    floats beyond Pluto -- requires Plutonium-238 for power.  <\/p>\n<p>    With more than 19 billion kilometers between Voyager 1 and the    sun, it can take hours for the craft's signals to reach the    station on Earth.  <\/p>\n<p>    Without the spacecrafts Plutonium-238 batteries, none of this    would be possible.  <\/p>\n<p>    \"Spacecraft's usually use the sun to provide electricity to    solar panels but that only works in the inner solar system,\"    Randy Attwood, of the Royal Astronomical Society, told CTV News    Toronto.  <\/p>\n<p>    \"Once we send spacecrafts out beyond Jupiter, there's not    enough sunlight out there to provide enough electricity to    allow the spacecraft to work.\"  <\/p>\n<p>    A source tells CTV News Toronto that the proposed plan would    have rods produced by Pacific Northwest National Laboratories    (PNNL) in Washington State and shipped to Darlington where they    would be inserted into the reactor core to produce the    Plutonium-238.  <\/p>\n<p>    The next time the rods need to be refueled, the new    partly-Canadian made space batteries would be inserted.  <\/p>\n<p>    The collaboration with PNNL is expected to be more efficient    both for costs and timing than alternative routes.  <\/p>\n<p>    Unlike Plutonium-239, the 238 isotope is not weapons grade,    thus practically impossible to use for a nuclear bomb and safe    to move when handled properly.  <\/p>\n<p>    Though it will take several years before the process gets    underway, one day, Ontarians will be able to look up into the    night sky and know that local technology played a role in the    exploration of space.  <\/p>\n<p>    With files from Paul Bliss.  <\/p>\n<p><!-- Auto Generated --><\/p>\n<p>View post:<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/toronto.ctvnews.ca\/darlington-power-plant-helps-fuel-nasa-s-space-exploration-1.3305383\" title=\"Darlington power plant helps fuel NASA's space exploration - CTV News\">Darlington power plant helps fuel NASA's space exploration - CTV News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> Rachael D'Amore, CTV Toronto Published Tuesday, February 28, 2017 6:21PM EST Last Updated Tuesday, February 28, 2017 7:14PM EST A local nuclear plant is stepping up to ensure NASAs ongoing exploration of deep space continues for years to come. CTV News Toronto has learned that the Darlington Nuclear Generating Station in Clarington, Ont. will produce and harvest Plutonium-238, a spacecraft fueling agent, for NASA.  <a href=\"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/space-exploration\/darlington-power-plant-helps-fuel-nasas-space-exploration-ctv-news.php\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"limit_modified_date":"","last_modified_date":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[431611],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-212320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-space-exploration"],"modified_by":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212320"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=212320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212320\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=212320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=212320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=212320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}