ECLSS Study for a European SpaceHaven 2005-01-2808
The forthcoming planetary missions require an autonomous crew habitation and a high mass of metabolic consumables. To minimise the launch mass and/or the logistic needs, these missions shall then be based on regenerative technologies able to obtain resources for the human life from the on board produced wastes, guaranteeing a high closure degree of the system.
In this context ESA has promoted a preliminary study called SpaceHaven, to understand which functions must be guaranteed for a long term and autonomous mission and to investigate about the hardware/technologies to be exploited to meet the identified functions. A dedicated demonstration program is to be proposed when needed technologies are neither available in Europe nor currently covered by a dedicated technological development.
In this paper the preliminary results of this study will be reported from the life support perspective, showing what are the needs of the identified missions, what are the functions to be provided by the SpaceHaven and a preliminary integrated schematic of the ECLS functions.
