The head of Aerojet Rocketdyne said electric propulsion is changing the satellite propulsion market faster than the company anticipated.
“It is a significant innovation, it is a game-changer,” Aerojet Rocketdyne CEO Warren Boley told Defense Daily in a recent interview.
Boley said electric propulsion is great because it makes satellites lighter by eliminating satellite fuel, decreasing launch costs and increasing the useful life of a satellite since it makes fuel from sunlight. Electric propulsion uses solar arrays to power thrusters that position satellites, Boley said.
Aerojet Rocketdyne has over 200 satellites in operational use with the company’s electric propulsion, Boley said, and that depending on mission and systems architecture, electric propulsion can be adapted to all customer needs. Boley said Aerojet Rocketdyne is bringing battery technology and electric propulsion together to offer customers greater solution sets. Boley said legacy Aerojet is focused on inspace propulsion going forward while legacy Rocketdyne brought into the merged company a lithium ion battery that happens to power the International Space Station (ISS).
Boley described Aerojet Rocketdyne as a propulsion company: liquid, solid, electric, air breathing and hypersonic propulsion. Aerojet in 2013 finalized its acquisition of the Rocketdyne business unit from Pratt & Whitney of United Technologies Corp. [UTX]. Boley said Aerojet and Rocketdyne have been transforming themselves over the past 20 years into missile defense, which he called a growth opportunity market.
Though it successfully acquired Rocketdyne from Pratt & Whitney, Pratt still owns the license to the Russian-made RD-180 rocket engine. Boley said he was uncertain as to whether Aerojet Rocketdyne would acquire the RD-180 license, which is rumored to be necessary to reproduce or replicate the engine domestically. The RD-180 is a hot issue as it is developed by the partially Russian state-owned NPO Energomash and a high ranking Russian official has allegedly threatened to sever supplies of the engine to the United States if it is used in future military launches.
Boley said there are still geopolitical issues and government approvals that have to be worked out for Aerojet Rocketdyne to acquire the RD-180 license.
“I think that is (to be determined) as to what happens with the current geopolitical situation,” Boley said. “It’s still being discussed, but the future needs more work.”
A blue ribbon panel suggested the Defense Department get going on finding a next-generation engine to replace the RD-180. Boley said Aerojet Rocketdyne is ready to compete for the Air Force’s next rocket engine, whatever it is, based on “significant technology readiness investment” that has already been made. Boley said Aerojet Rocketdyne is coming off a very successful J2-X program for NASA where the company achieved 100 percent power in 29 days. Boley said, in context, it took 599 days for the Space Shuttle main engine to achieve 100 percent power over 139 tests.
The J2-X is an advanced engine capable of powering the upper stage of NASA’s heavy-lift Space Launch System (SLS), which is geared toward taking missions beyond low-earth orbit (LEO). Fueled by liquid oxygen (LOX)/liquid hydrogen, the J-2X is capable of delivering up to 294,000 pounds of thrust, according to NASA.
Aerojet Rocketdyne is a division of GenCorp [GY].