47th International Astronautical Federation Symposium on Economics in Space Operations Novel Commercial Applications of Space 7-11 October 1996, Beijing, China$$$$Consortium for Industrial Research in the Use of Space for Oil and Environment industries

摘要

In 1990 a task force was convened by the Commercialization Office of the European Space Agency to examine the potential for the industrial use of space. In 1991 the task force submitted a report defining RADIUS (Research Associations for the Development of Industrial Use of Space). After an intense competition, C-CORE of St. John's, Newfoundland in Canada was awarded the honor of forming the first RADIUS for its proposed consortium dedicated to energy and environmental research. C-CORE subsequently established CIRUS - Consortium for Industrial Research in the Use of Space - whose mandate is to provide benefits to both the energy and environmental sectors by performing fluid physics experiments in reduced gravity. The research so far has focused on oil recovery science and contaminant transport. The use of a reduced gravity environment in performing the experiments allows all parameters to be isolated in empirical modelling and has attracted strong support from the energy sector. A number of multi-national companies have made commitments to CIRUS, recognizing the benefits to be gained through this unique work. One of the main activities of CIRUS at present is the development of three experiments scheduled to fly on board NASA's Space Shuttle. This program, entitled MIRROR (Microgravity, Industry Related Research for Oil Recovery), has obtained solid support from the oil industry in Europe and Canada. This talk will describe the concept of the RADIUS programme, the role of CIRUS and present details on some of the CIRUS microgravity projects and MIRROR in particular.