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PIA13891: Enceladus the Powerhouse
 Target Name:  Enceladus
 Is a satellite of:  Saturn
 Mission:  Cassini-Huygens
 Spacecraft:  Cassini Orbiter
 Instrument:  Composite Infrared Spectrometer
 Product Size:  722 x 308 pixels (w x h)
 Produced By:  JPL
 Other  
Information: 
JPL News Release 2011-067
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA13891.tif (668.2 kB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA13891.jpg (41.47 kB)

Click on the image above to download a moderately sized image in JPEG format (possibly reduced in size from original)

Original Caption Released with Image:

This graphic, using data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft, shows how the south polar terrain of Saturn's moon Enceladus emits much more power than scientists had originally predicted.

Data from Cassini composite infrared spectrometer indicate that the south polar terrain of Enceladus has an internal heat-generated power of about 15.8 gigawatts. That is approximately 2.6 times the power output of all the hot springs in the Yellowstone region, or comparable to 20 coal-fueled power stations.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The composite infrared spectrometer team is based at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

For more information about the Cassini-Huygens mission visit http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov and http://www.nasa.gov/cassini.

Image Credit:
NASA/JPL/SWRI/SSI

Image Addition Date:
2011-03-07