What matters is the effective exhaust velocity. For chemical rockets it’s 3 km/s. The article doesn’t seem to mention it?
On top of that, ion drive travel is notoriously slow. So it’s not good for human travel because you would need more life support system for the longer journey, including more food and water, which makes the rocket heavier and is thus undesirable. It would only be useful for cargo transport where it doesn’t matter whether it spends 6 months or 3 years in space.
Nah ion thrusters are way more likely to be useful for human travel because they are supposed to thrust constantly. Chemical rockets thrust for minutes, not months.
What matters is the effective exhaust velocity. For chemical rockets it’s 3 km/s. The article doesn’t seem to mention it?
On top of that, ion drive travel is notoriously slow. So it’s not good for human travel because you would need more life support system for the longer journey, including more food and water, which makes the rocket heavier and is thus undesirable. It would only be useful for cargo transport where it doesn’t matter whether it spends 6 months or 3 years in space.
Nah ion thrusters are way more likely to be useful for human travel because they are supposed to thrust constantly. Chemical rockets thrust for minutes, not months.