Navy Develops New Ship-Board Power for Lasers, Radar & Weapons

Video Above: US Congressman: Navy Needs Drones, Light Amphibious Warship and 5th-Gen Air Supremacy to Counter China

By Kris Osborn, President, Center for Military Modernization

(Washington D.C.) Firing high-powered lasers to incinerate enemy drones, jamming guidance systems for incoming anti-ship missiles, detecting missiles and approaching threats with high-powered radar and launching EW attacks to “blind” or confuse enemy radar and communications …. are all missions US Navy warships will be increasingly required to perform.

Scaling ship-fired lasers to hit larger targets and farther ranges, detecting smaller threat objects at twice the distance with radar and interfering with or disabling enemy radar with stronger EW systems are all similar operations in that they rely upon massive amounts of exportable, mobile electrical power. As enemy weapons and sensors increasingly become more dangerous, powerful and longer range, US Navy ships will need to expedite a commensurate effort to counter a new generation of potential threats, something which will require much greater levels of on-board power. It is not easy for weapons developers to integrate breakthrough levels of electrical power onto warships as the form factor must align with the available space on the vessel and power will need to be both stored and transmitted efficiently.

Navy developers have long emphasized the continued need to engineer newer, smaller form-factor, highly efficient mobile energy storage and distribution, in part with a specific mind to supporting breakthrough high-power laser weapons and radar. These technologies, and the concepts of operation associated with them, continue to be defining elements of the Navy’s DDG 51 Flight III destroyer program and now emerging DDG(X) effort.

Prime Power

In an effort to address this, Northrop Grumman is developing a new “prime power” equipment solution that leverages and consolidates existing Navy ship-board systems powered by Northrop such as SPY-6 radar and SEWIP Block III EW technology. The concept, according to Northrop Grumman developers, is to integrate power technologies the firm is already using on Navy warships and “leverage current power solutions the Navy already has.”

The technology, called Multifunction Prime Power System, or MPPS, is slated to integrate onto upgraded US Navy Arleigh Burke Class DDG 51 Flight IIA destroyers as well as the now fast emerging Flight III ships.