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This unclassified Defense Intelligence Reference Document from the Defense Intelligence Agency is dated 2 March 2010. It was produced in FY 2009 under the Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications (AAWSA) Program. The report reviews work on using positrons as aerospace fuel. It covers air-breathing turbojet and ramjet engines, unmanned aircraft, missiles, single-stage reusable vehicles, positron rockets and a crewed Mars mission, along with how positrons could be produced and stored. It concludes that a first positron-powered flight around the globe could be possible within 10 years.
“Low Earth orbit”4 pages
UNCLASSIFIED//509 QFFIQl.l1ls WlilE 8HL\i Assuming that 10 16 positrons/sec can be realized in the next 10 years, then 150 micrograms could be produced in 6 months to enable a globe-encircling flight of a small air-breathing turbojet UAV as discussed earlier. Positron Costs An independent study has been done to determine future costs of positrons and, for comparison, antiprotons as well. The results, shown in Table 6, are based on data for existing sources and proposals for future sources. 60, 61 , 62 Table 6. Positron and Antiproton Expected Costs in the Next 10 Years Source Trap Injection Filling Rate When $/JOULE Enerav (MeV) (sec1) (annihilation) CERN AD (pbart· 0.01 -0.1 4 X 10° Now ? Fermilab lnbar)"" <0.002 2.8 X 10' Now 333• e+/14 MeV e- linac"'/ILC~· 0.1 5 x10··/10" 2011/19 04/0.004 .. * $100 million/year (est. op. cost). ** $5 million/year (est op. cost, adJusted for inflation)/$100 million/year (est. op. cost). Two clear results of the study should be noted. First, measured on a scale of dollars per joule of annihilation energy, positrons cost less than antiprotons by a factor of 1,000-100,000. Because each antiproton produces 1,836 times more energy per annihilation than a positron, this result appears to defy logic. However, the laboratory energy threshold for producing antiprotons is 6,000 times greater than for positrons, requiring a relatively complex proton synchrotron that is costly to construct and run. In addition, antiprotons are made at much higher laboratory energy than positrons and require costly apparatuses to decelerate them to trapping energies. On the other hand, because electrons and positrons are relativistic at very low energy, their electron production and secondary systems are comparatively simple and less costly to operate and maintain than proton systems. These factors, combined with the absence of radioactive residue associated with positron annihilation, make positrons the obvious choice over antiprotons. Second, the cost of positrons is projected to be $0.004/l x 180 Ml/μg = $720K/μg. Hence, the cost of 1 gram is $0.72T, or 5 percent of the 2008 U.S. gross domestic product (GDP). A 2000 NASA study 63 on which this author collaborated placed the cost of antiprotons at $64T/g, consistent with the $333/J figure in the second line of Table 5, and roughly six times the 2000 GDP. Unfortunately, this is still being quoted in U.S. scientific and government communities. The dramatic reduction in the unit cost of antimatter since 2000 is due to a new emphasis on positrons by the physics community, and hopefully this paper will help spread that good news. Earlier, a nonstop flight around the globe by a small positron UAV was described as equivalent to the 1927 Spirit of St. Louis transatlantic flight of Charles Lindbergh. From 23 UNCLASSIFIED/ 1«F81it 8FFI@Itllt ~:!II!! 8HLV
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Report, from the dia collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 35 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.