Aerojet Rocketdyne, a GenCorp (NYSE: GY) company, was awarded a contract to research and develop environmentally sustainable monopropellants and gas generators for rocket and missile propulsion and Divert Attitude Control Systems. The company is working with the U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Research, Development and Engineering Center; the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory at Edwards Air Force Base; and the U.S. Army Medical Command to develop a new family of high-performing liquid propellants. The effort is funded through the Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program, an office of the Department of Defense.
Under the three-year contract, Aerojet Rocketdyne’s Redmond, Washington team will lead the effort to conduct small-scale testing of potential monopropellant candidates in the laboratory, scaling up likely candidates in the Sacramento Chemical Synthesis Laboratory, then performing subscale thruster testing to select the most promising ones for future research. Parallel efforts will ensure that these compositions are safe to handle and leave a minimal environmental footprint.
“Aerojet Rocketdyne has decades of experience researching next-generation propellants for space and defense applications. That research has covered many different types of technologies and resulted in maturing propellant and propulsion system technologies from early lab research and development to fielding flight systems,” said Julie Van Kleeck, vice president of Space Advanced Programs at Aerojet Rocketdyne. “We are excited to capitalize on our past accomplishments and are looking forward to helping develop the next generation of advanced green propellants – enhancing the capabilities of future systems while making the world we work in safer.”
As part of its work with next-generation propellants, Aerojet Rocketdyne recently finalized flight designs for propulsion systems that use the Air Force-developed propellant AF-M315E, which will fly on the NASA Green Propellant Infusion Mission program in 2016. The green propellants developed through this new contract would provide options for future spiral upgrades to the technology being flown next year. Aerojet Rocketdyne is also a leader in green bipropellant, solid and gelled propellants.
Aerojet Rocketdyne is a world-recognized aerospace and defense leader providing propulsion and energetics to the space, missile defense and strategic systems, tactical systems and armaments areas, in support of domestic and international markets. GenCorp is a diversified company that provides innovative solutions that create value for its customers in the aerospace and defense, and real estate markets. Additional information about Aerojet Rocketdyne and GenCorp can be obtained by visiting the companies’ websites at www.Rocket.com and www.GenCorp.com.
