DOE's Way-Out Reactors: The Department of Energy wants to spend $72 million next year to design and build reactors for military space applications; nothing like them has been built before.

The SP-100 reactor, envisioned long before Star Wars, was to power civilian structures such as the space station and orbiting commercial labs. According to the SDI Organization, it will be the cornerstone for SDI, used as a no-maintenance, general source of energy for the military's infrastructure - weapons scale power will come later. DOE wants to spend $72 in FY 1977 to design and build these reactors. Funding problems with Congress, as well as some of the technology and timetables are discussed here.