{"id":491458,"date":"2026-06-23T11:50:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T11:50:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/491458\/"},"modified":"2026-06-23T11:50:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T11:50:09","slug":"chinas-new-super-fuel-could-help-long-march-rockets-increase-payload-by-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/491458\/","title":{"rendered":"China\u2019s new \u2018super fuel\u2019 could help Long March rockets increase payload by 10%"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">A Chinese Long March-12 rocket launched last week used a new super fuel that boosted the rocket\u2019s payload capacity by 10 per cent, according to its developer.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Instead of designing bigger, more expensive airframes, The Beijing Aerospace Test Technology Research Institute, a subsidiary of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC), has been working on ways to maximise the energy density of the fuel used.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Most rocket launches today use liquid oxygen-kerosene (kerolox) engines, but the fuel mixture they have traditionally used \u2013 based on refined petroleum \u2013 has now reached its performance limits.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Instead, researchers have developed a new \u201chigh-energy synthetic kerosene\u201d to fire the engines.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The CASC said last week that this boosted the engine\u2019s specific impulse \u2013 a measure of engine efficiency, similar to fuel economy in cars \u2013 by around eight seconds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Chinese Long March-12 rocket launched last week used a new super fuel that boosted the rocket\u2019s payload&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":491459,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[246375,22836,103331,16666,130643,112524,246374,111,139,69,147,1503],"class_list":["post-491458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-science","tag-beijing-aerospace-test-technology-research-institute","tag-casc","tag-china-aerospace-science-and-technology-corporation","tag-falcon","tag-falcon-heavy","tag-hainan","tag-long-march-rockets","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-science","tag-spacex"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=491458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491458\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/491459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=491458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=491458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=491458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}