US EPA

8151847 

Meetings & Symposia 

Green solid propellants for launchers 

Calabro, M; Wingborg, N 

2016 

International Astronautical Federation, IAF 

English 

In the panorama of space launchers, solid propulsion has found a domain of application to first stage or strap-on boosters, in this one solid propulsion is always cost effective whatever the launcher size could be. Another domain of excellence is the boost stages of small launcher such as the Vega launcher. All the civilian Solid Rockets converged on the use of a composite solid propellant based on polybutadiene as binder, ammonium perchlorate AP as oxidizer and aluminium as a fuel. However, solid propulsion suffers of a lack of performance versus the liquid couple LOX/Kerosene and of a potential environmental and health, concerns related to Ammonium Perchlorate AP. Alternative solid propellants based on the green oxidizers ammonium dinitramide, ADN, and ammonium nitrate, AN, are developed in the EU funded project GRAIL (project following the HISP project). By using a non-energetic binders and by varying the ratio between ADN and AN, it seems possible to develop a green propellant with properties similar to state of the art AP based solid propellants. This paper presents the methodology to select a domain of formulation to explore (based on the potential payload increase of a given launcher) and gives an overview of the project. 

ADN; Dinitramide; Formulation; Green solid propellant; Perchlorate; Performance