Space is a difficult place to be. People are complaining online about Texas weather going from hot to freezing in just days or hours (and maybe even a week’s weather that belongs in all four seasons), but just a few hundred miles above the state, the swings are even wilder. . Near Earth, orbital space in the shadows can be as cold as 100-150 degrees below zero, but above the boiling point in sunlight.
But people in spacecraft, in spacesuits, or even on the International Space Station don’t usually die from those obviously deadly temperatures. So NASA is not only an agency that is adept at aerospace and space travel, but is also quite good at heating and cooling things. The proof is in the pudding (or lack of frozen/boiling astronauts). Plus, we shouldn’t assume that NASA stopped inventing things when the space shuttle was designed, so HVAC technology still has to improve, right?
Many upcoming NASA space missions will require advanced heat transfer capabilities to properly perform thermal control. Several systems will rely on this technology, including: nuclear fission systems for future missions to places like the Moon and Mars, vapor compression heat pumps to support lunar and Martian habitats, and also aboard spacecraft themselves that provide thermal control and advanced life support.
So yes, progress and inventions continue even for something as boring as heating, air-conditioning and cooling of vital space systems.
A team contracted by NASA is developing advanced technology that will allow space systems to not only manage proper temperatures more efficiently, but also reduce the size and weight of associated hardware. Why? Since moving weight to space is expensive, cutting back on weight is essential.
I don’t know about you, but that sounds a lot like the technology that electric vehicles need. Batteries (especially on fast charging) generate a lot of heat, and you can’t put a massive building air conditioning system on an EV if you want some range.
The Flow Boiling and Condensation Experiment
A team of researchers, led by Issam Mudawar and including experts from Purdue University, developed the Flow Boiling and Condensation Experiment (FBCE) to enable two-phase fluid flow and heat transfer experiments in microgravity. Using a lower temperature liquid and turning it into vapor allows heat to be transferred more efficiently. When the liquid supplied to the channel is supercooled (at a temperature well below the boiling point), this process is greatly improved. This new technique of “supercooled flowing boiling” results in much better heat transfer efficiency than other methods and could potentially be used to control the temperature of systems in space.
The FBCE was delivered to the ISS in August 2021 and began providing boiling data on microgravity currents early next year. The results of these experiments will allow for more efficient designs of future space systems that require temperature control.
Benefit of people here on earth
One of the great things NASA and SpaceX skeptics like to say is that the money should be spent on things people need on Earth. But as is often the case (sunglasses are a prime example), space technology often finds its way back to where it came from and is used for the benefit of people here on the ground.
One of the biggest problems with future charging of EVs is the power involved. Everyone wants an electric car that can be charged in five minutes, just like a petrol car. But to do that, we have to send a lot of energy through a cable into the car. Put enough electricity through a wire and it will start generating a lot of heat unless you make the cable huge, thick and heavy. That will not work out well if we want people to be able to charge their own EV.
But NASA’s technology could provide the answer.
Mudawar’s team recently used the principles of “supercooled flowing cooking” they learned from NASA’s FBCE experiments while charging electric vehicles. With this new technology, dielectric (non-electrically conductive) liquid coolant is pumped through the charging cable to capture the heat generated by the current-carrying conductor. Subcooled flow cooking not only allows Mudawar’s team to deliver 4.6 times more power than any other charger available on the market today, but also removes a total of up to 24.22 kilowatts of heat.
Purdue proved that a new charging cable can deliver 2,400 amps of power, significantly more than the 1,400 amps NASA would need to charge an electric car in just five minutes. This newly developed technology significantly reduces the time it takes to charge a vehicle and could pave the way for a much wider use of electric cars, by removing one of the major bottlenecks that bring up the naysayers. .
Plus, the cable is something that the average person can easily grab and put in their car.
This is not the only obstacle
Of course, that level of fast charging isn’t the only thing that keeps 5-minute charging from becoming a reality. Battery technology, electrical infrastructure and charging stations all need serious upgrades. However, all these problems are being worked on by other researchers.
The other problem is that for many anti-EV people it’s just an excuse. You could by all means provide an experience that is easier and better than gas-powered cars, and they would still come up with a reason not to embrace change. Change is difficult and uncomfortable, and many people are stuck in their behavior or have weird political reasons for not making the switch.
A bigger question: is this even the right approach?
While the work NASA and Purdue are doing here is very impressive, I also wonder if it’s the right approach for the average car. For some applications, especially aviation, marine and large land vehicles such as semi-trucks, supplying this type of power will be important for electrification. But if every car on the road used that kind of power regularly, we’d have to answer some serious logistical, infrastructure and environmental questions.
Personally, I don’t think replicating the gas car experience with electric is a great goal. Most charging should be done at home while sleeping or at work using solar energy, if possible, using much less power. Fast charging should meet the needs of humans and should only very rarely happen in five minutes. Even on road trips, people need a few minutes to go to the bathroom, eat and stretch their legs. Encouraging people (probably through pricing, as ultra-mega-fast charging will be expensive) to use slower options whenever possible would make the EV transition a lot easier.
Featured image furnished by NASA. Purdue University’s electric vehicle charging facility can charge a car in five minutes. The charging cable is internally cooled by dielectric fluid using subcooled electric cooking. Purdue University/Jared Pike
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