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A preliminary design of a Life Support System (LSS) has been developed as part of an ongoing comprehensive trade study of advanced processor technologies and system architectures for an Initial Lunar Outpost. The design is based on a mission scenario requiring intermittent occupation of a lunar surface habitat by a crew of four. It incorporates physiochemical process technologies that were considered for Space Station Freedom. A system-level simulation model of the design was developed to obtain steady-state material balances for each LSS processor. The mass flow rate predictions were used to obtain estimates of the LSS mass, volume, and power consumption by means of processor sizing correlations that were extrapolated from Space Station Freedom processor designs.

A generic engineering trade study methodology has been developed to provide an effective framework for the system analysis of regenerative live support systems. The performance of engineering tradeoffs is a key technique in a rigorous system engineering process that is being used to develop advanced regenerative life support technology at NASA Ames Research Center. The trade study methodology consists of the following steps: 1) deriving relevant life support system functional requirements from a given space exploration mission scenario of interest; 2) developing a tradeoff decision methodology consisting of a set of evaluation criteria and corresponding weighting functions grouped into a relational hierarchy; 3) synthesizing a set of design options to be evaluated during the study; 4) modeling and analyzing each design option to generate data to input to a quantitative scoring scheme; and 5) evaluating each design option using the information developed in the preceding steps.

This paper compares scaleup correlations developed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and at the Langley Research Center (LaRC) for various life support hardware to estimate mass, volume, and power consumption values as a function of feed or product mass flow rates. The scaleup correlations are provided for a few selected advanced life support technologies developed for the Space Station Freedom (SSF). In addition, correlation validity limits and sources of data on various life support hardware are also discussed.

The U.S./International Space Station will be assembled incrementally using nineteen flights of the National Space Transportation System (NSTS) Space Shuttle to complete the configuration. This process will produce nineteen different spacecraft configurations, each of which must perform as a fully functional, independent space vehicle. This results in unique design requirements on station distributed systems necessary to allow incremental system buildup while providing some minimum capability early in the assembly sequence. The Thermal Control System (TCS), like electrical power, attitude control, and communications must be present on the initial flight configuration and must grow in capability as assembly continues. This paper summarizes the Space Station program requirements for the TCS, and outlines the capabilities of the TCS for each assembly configuration.