Heat pump conceptual study and design

 
Maximum spacecraft radiator size is fixed based on the available launch volume.  The methods to increase the heat rejection is to increase the surface area by using deployable radiators or to increase radiator temperature. The Heat Pump provides the capability of raising the radiator temperature above the temperature of the equipment where more heat can be rejected compared to a conventional radiator with the same surface area.

Objectives
The objective of this activity is to design and develop a Heat Pump system that is adaptable for Earth Observation, Exploration, Science and Telecommunication missions. In addition, a breadboard is manufactured and tested in order to validate the concept and to measurement the coefficient of performance.

Achievements and status
A breadboard with three novel electrically-driven high-speed compressors in a serial configuration has been designed and built. During the testing,  the breadboard achieved a coefficient of performance of 2.6, which was considerably higher than the requirement of 2.

Benefits
Heat Pump allows to increase the power density of the spacecraft without increasing its volume. There is a very strong interest, in particular for Telecom applications to be used on High-throughput telecom satellites which have a high power dissipation payload.

Next steps
Possible funding from GSTP 6, ARTES or NEOSAT