ENABLE-HEAT (ENABLE-HEAT)

NASA has committed to returning to the Moon and Mars, not just for exploration, but to establish long-term settlements that utilize local resources, evolving beyond base camps into fully functional industrial infrastructure. For instance, NASA research has shown that full-scale resource utilization on the Moon will require power systems with capacities in the tens of megawatts or more. A critical challenge in generating and utilizing such large amounts of power on the lunar and Martian surfaces is efficient heat rejection. Lacking liquid water and a dense atmosphere, the main mechanism of heat transfer is radiation. Low-mass, high-power thermal radiation technologies offer significant advantages for implementing large-scale power systems in space and on celestial surfaces. The main technical hurdle is that the waste heat temperature dictates radiator size. Increasing the temperature at which the heat is rejected would reduce the size of the radiator. For example, according to the Stefan-Boltzmann law, a doubling of the waste heat rejection temperature results in a sixteen-fold reduction in radiator size. Furthermore, nuclear electric propulsion (NEP) studies have shown that increasing radiator temperature increases specific power of the radiator by a factor of ~4.  Our multi-center, multidisciplinary team will address these high-power applications in space and on planetary surfaces, including heat rejected from power generation, In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) material processing, excavation, and manufacturing. Lower exergy heat generated by habitats, and mobility platforms will also be considered. We aim to identify the key waste heat rejection challenges and tackle the issue of high-power, low-grade (i.e., low temperature) waste heat by incorporating a recently demonstrated, novel solid-state heat pump technology into the system design and trade space. Our aim is to assess current thermal architecture for lunar and Martian architectures so that a no-moving-part thermoacoustic energy conversion system can be developed; the acoustic technology will efficiently transform high-power, low-grade waste heat into high-grade waste heat, consequently reducing radiator footprint.

This technology is needed in the next decade as NASA begins to field high power space systems that generate high-grade and low-grade waste heat such as Fission Surface Power (FSP), NEP, and future industrial infrastructure consisting of integrated ISRU, construction, manufacturing, habitat, and mobility features. Efficient exergy conversion of low-grade waste heat to higher-grade waste heat reduces radiator size by an order of magnitude to ENABLE heat rejection. Today’s relatively low power heat pump technology such as Peltier, reverse Stirling, or reverse Brayton require electrical power to operate and offer limited scaling potential. The proposed system has no moving parts, does not require electrical power to operate, and does not use deleterious working fluids. Overall, this will be a key building block for future high power space systems and will be properly integrated into the full-scale thermal ecosystem that our multi-center team has proposed to analyze and develop and test.

This is early/mid-stage (TRL 2) — the most realistic path in is NASA SBIR/STTR, which funds small businesses and research institutions to develop technology aligned with NASA's needs (equity-free, phased funding). Check whether a current SBIR/STTR solicitation topic overlaps with this project's technology area, or contact the project directly (above) to ask.

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