Experts: Navy Would Spend Billions to Answer Trump’s Call to Return Carriers to Steam Catapults

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USNI News By: Ben Werner 5/28/2019

President Donald Trump again called to install steam catapults on future aircraft carriers, in a move experts say would cost billions of dollars and reduce the capital ships’ capabilities.

Trump, who has been critical of the Ford-class carriers’ new electromagnetic aircraft launch system (EMALS) system, said he prefers the steam-powered catapults found on the older Nimitz-class CVNs. He again called on the Navy to revert back to the old technology while speaking to naval forces in Japan over the Memorial Day weekend.

Tuesday, while visiting sailors and Marines aboard amphibious assault ship USS Wasp (LHD-1), Trump faulted EMALS for causing delays and cost overruns on the first-in-class USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78).

“We’re spending all that money on electric, and nobody knows what it’s going to be like in bad conditions,” Trump said in his speech. “I’m going to just put out an order, we’re going to use steam.”

However, installing steam catapults on a Ford-class hull is not so simple. Ford-class hulls were designed to accommodate an entire power system that doesn’t rely on steam pipped throughout the ship. Instead, the power generated from the nuclear reactors drive turbines that power a shipwide electrical grid. Space on the ships is allocated differently because there’s no need for all the steam piping found on Nimitz-class ships.

“The Navy would have to spend several billion dollars to redesign the ship,” Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, told USNI News on Tuesday.

More than a decade ago, the Navy spent $1.3 billion on Ford-class design work, according to the Northrop Grumman 2006 annual report. Northrop Grumman later spun off its shipbuilding business into what is now Huntington Ingalls Industries, the Ford-class builder.

The Navy would have to look at USS George H.W. Bush (CVN-77), the last Nimitz-class carrier built, for design ideas. But the Navy can’t just use old Nimitz-class plans because of other new technologies developed since Bush was built, Clark said. The Navy would need to create a Ford-class and Nimitz-class hybrid.

More: https://news.usni.org/2019/05/28/experts-navy-would-spend-billions-to-answer-trumps-call-to-return-carriers-to-steam-catapults