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The Closed-Loop Air REvitalisation System ARES is a regenerative life support system for closed habitats. With regenerative processes the ARES covers the life support functions: 1. Removal of carbon dioxide from the spacecraft atmosphere via a regenerative adsorption/desorption process, 2. Supply of breathable oxygen via electrolysis of water, 3. Catalytic conversion of carbon dioxide with hydrogen to water and methane. ARES will be accommodated in a double ISPR Rack which will contain all main and support functions like power and data handling and process water management. It is foreseen to be installed onboard the International Space Station (ISS) in the Columbus Module in 2013. After an initial technology demonstration phase ARES shall continue to operate thus enhancing the capabilities of the ISS Life Support System as acknowledged by NASA [5]. Due to its regenerative processes ARES will allow a significant reduction of water upload to the ISS.

Astrium investigates Methane Pyrolysis in the perspective of long-duration exploration missions. In particular this process, which recovers Hydrogen from Methane, allows reaching the maximum closure level of the Air Revitalization System ARES, see figure 1. Past studies as presented in ref. /1/ had been reviewed in light of today's technical advancement and a technology trade-off, supported by bread boarding, resulting in the pre selection of the plasma technique to perform the Methane Pyrolysis. In parallel two methods for plasma provision are investigated: Direct Current Plasma, sustained by a discharge arc rotating in a nozzle to supply energy to the flowing through carrier gas. Micro Wave (MW) Plasma, sustained by a MW within a Quartz tube embedded in a MW resonator cuboid Study activities did concentrate on Development testing of pre selected plasma Pyrolysis technology.

1 The Closed-Loop Air REvitalisation System ARES is a proof of technology Payload. The objective of ARES is to demonstrate with regenerative processes: the provision of the capability for carbon dioxide removal from the module atmosphere, the return supply of breathable oxygen within a closed-loop process, the conversion of the hydrogen, resulting from the oxygen generation via electrolysis, to water. The ARES Payload is foreseen to be installed - in 2012 - onboard the ISS in the Columbus Module. The operation of ARES - in a representative manned microgravity environment - will produce valuable operational data on a system which is based on technologies which are different from other air revitalization systems presently in use. The ARES Technology Demonstrator Payload development started in 2003 with a Phase B, see references [1], [2], [3] and [4]. ARES is presently in Phase C1 and a PDR is scheduled for the beginning of 2009.

The European Space Agency (ESA) recently has concluded a feasibility study for the European Crew Transfer Vehicle (CTV) to become operational for the first manned transfer flight to the International Space Station Alpha (ISSA) by 2005. The CTV, to be launched by Ariane 5, shall provide life support functions for a crew of four astronauts and about 100 hours autonomous flight duration. These life support functions comprise in particular atmosphere supply & pressure control, air conditioning, liquid management, and fire detection & suppression. The purpose of this paper is to identify the CTV requirements and to describe the capsule inherent design drivers. Furthermore the present design status of the CTV ECLSS is summarised herein. Optional design solutions are proposed, facilitating the reduction of design complexity, volumes and mass.

The representation of functions of Environment Control and Life Support Systems in ESATAN Models requires the implementation of automatic control features. Mainly the air temperature and air mass flow are subject to automatic control. This paper shows - as an example - the implementation of a PI- (Proportional- and Integral-) Controller to represent the effects of automatic control of HERMES ECLSS. Implementing these functions in ESATAN requires different approaches for steady state and transient solutions. The control algorithm is implemented in the model so that it is passed through in each timestep. Hence the setting of the active components is updated in each timestep. For the calculation of steady state cases the control algorithm had to be implemented so that the controller parameters are not timestep dependent. The paper shows that active control features can be implemented in ESATAN Models by adding some subroutines.