Startup NewRocket has learned how to turn kerosene into a gel to create a safe, convenient, high-energy and environmentally friendly rocket fuel.
Israeli aerospace startup NewRocket is developing rocket fuel in the form of gel. It is expected that this will allow the use of non-toxic components and make the transportation and use of fuel safer and more controlled. The head of NewRocket, Ilan Harel, said this in an interview for the Times of Israel.
Jet engines, which are equipped with modern spacecraft, run on various types of fuel, but, as Harel noted, they all have significant disadvantages. Dimethylhydrazine and ammonium perchlorate are extremely toxic, and liquid hydrogen is difficult to store, and it is extremely dangerous and requires cryogenic conditions. NewRocket believes that their fuel PowerGel will be devoid of these disadvantages.
The project is based on the work of benny Natan, a Professor At the Israeli Technion Institute of technology, who gave the company exclusive rights to use them. Ilan Harel explains that PowerGel is produced on the basis of kerosene, with various "secret" additives. They not only turn it into a semi-liquid gel, but also improve useful properties: for example, making the material self-igniting when in contact with an oxidizer — oxygen.
Harel adds that his company is now continuing to search for investors willing to support the project. So far, the British Fund Consensus Business Group has invested in it. In addition, funds were received from the Israeli incubator Incubit Ventures, which develops the local Department of innovation (IIA) together with the Elbit Systems concern.
"The space industry is going through a stage of deep transformation," commented a representative of Incubit Ventures. — For decades, this sector remained under full state control. Now, with the advent of private projects such as Elon Musk's SpaceX, the rapid development of the "civilian" market has begun."
It is not surprising that even fuel is becoming the subject of intense interest from non-state developers. And PowerGel is not the only one of such bold projects: for example, we have already written about the creation of rocket fuel based on ORGANOMETALLIC compounds.
