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The threat of Chemical Warfare (CW) may have increased even as the nuclear threat may have decreased. Terrorists and threatening countries can easily convert factories or use only a van to manufacture chemical weapons. However, no current operational U.S. military aircrafts are designed with any type of CW defense. Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical (NBC) filters will be used in the future Environmental Control Systems. The filters have advanced from the low pressure type to high pressure in semi-closed system such as the V-22 aircraft and closed loop system. A simplified Integrated Closed Environmental Control System (ICECS) has been developed in a joint U.S./Canada program to meet environmental threats. The initial effort demonstrates the advantages of the closed loop vapor cycle over an open air environmental control system.

Vapor cycle environmental control systems are being designed for efficient electronic cooling on advanced fighter aircraft. A vapor cycle system, employing a two-phase refrigerant, must be able to operate in a variety of attitudes in a variable-gravity flight environment. In order to verify operation of an agile aircraft's vapor cycle system prior to flight test, the Air Force is upgrading the Armstrong Laboratory's Dynamic Environment Simulator centrifuge. This paper will discuss the facility, the types of testing that will be used to simulate flight loads, and the design of vapor cycle components which will allow them to operate in a variable-G environment.