Space industrialization. Volume 2: Space industrialization background, needs, and opportunities
For abstract, see N78-25107.
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For abstract, see N78-25107.
Methods for selecting the most viable program options were examined along with techniques for hardware development. Several separate program options were defined, and future plans for space exploitation were reviewed. Hardware elements in various sectors of space are discussed in detail to provide a definition for the major functional elements and operations.
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Recent advances in control-system design and simulation are discussed in reviews and reports. Among the topics considered are fast algorithms for generating near-optimal binary decision programs, trajectory control of robot manipulators with compensation of load effects via a six-axis force sensor, matrix integrators for real-time simulation, a high-level control language for an autonomous land vehicle, and a practical engineering design method for stable model-reference adaptive systems. Also addressed are the identification and control of flexible-limb robots with unknown loads, adaptive control and robust adaptive control for manipulators with feedforward compensation, adaptive pole-placement controllers with predictive action, variable-structure strategies for motion control, and digital signal-processor-based variable-structure controls.
This study examined the service quality of 25 U.S. airlines (1987-1996) using data from the Department of Transportation's Air Travel Consumer Report. After a total quality and total complaint rate was calculated for these airlines, a 95 percent confidence interval was placed around the yearly and company means calculated to examine those cases that were significantly different from the mean. Results indicate that while the major carriers are converging toward a higher level of quality, there continues to be significant yearly variation. The service quality of regional carriers was much lower than major carriers and showed much greater variation.
Now that the NASA Commercial Crew Program (CCP) is beginning its full certification contract for crew transportation to the International Space Station (ISS), is it time for industry to embrace a minimum set of core safety attributes? Those attributes can then be evolved into an industry-led set of basic safety standards and requirements. After 50 years of human space travel sponsored by governments, there are two basic conditions that now exist within the international space industry. The first, there is enough of a space-faring history to encourage the space industry to design, develop and operate human spaceflight systems without government contracts for anything other than services. Second, industry is capable of defining and enforcing a set of industry-based safety attributes and standards for human spaceflight to low-Earth orbit (LEO). This paper will explore both of these basic conditions with a focus on the safety attributes and standards. In the United States, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is now starting to dialogue with industry about the basic safety principles and attributes needed for potential future regulatory oversight. This process is not yet formalized and will take a number of years once approval is given to move forward. Therefore, throughout the next few years, it is an excellent time and opportunity for industry to collaborate together and develop the core set of attributes and standards. As industry engages and embraces a common set of safety attributes, then government agencies, like the FAA and NASA can use that industry-based product to strengthen their efforts on a safe commercial spaceflight foundation for the future. As the commercial space industry takes the lead role in establishing core safety attributes, and then enforcing those attributes, the entire planet can move away from governmental control of design and development and let industry expand safe and successful space operations in LEO. At that point the governmental agencies can focus on oversight of the industries' defined standards and enforcement for common welfare of the space-faring populous and overall public safety.
Clear and understandable definitions of advanced energy technologies are not common and often confuse those who are not experts. This review paper addresses a critical issue in the field of heat pumps: the ambiguity surrounding the term “industrial heat pump.” The term, as discussed in various literature and media, often leads to misconceptions about the capabilities and applications of heat pumps, particularly in industrial contexts. This review paper seeks to refine and unify the definition of industrial heat pumps by analyzing existing academic and commercial literature, industry reports, and classifications. Unique identifiers explored for the definition of an industrial heat pump include the use of waste heat, operating temperature ranges, size specifications, and specific end-use applications. The study reveals differences in how industrial heat pumps are defined in academic and commercial contexts, highlighting the need for a standardized definition to facilitate better communication among manufacturers, policymakers, and end users. This is especially important considering recent legislative efforts such as the HEAT Act, which seeks to promote industrial heat pump adoption. The proposed definition aims to provide clarity while supporting the effective deployment of industrial heat pumps. With proper adoption, the definition will help promote the role of industrial heat pumps in achieving energy efficiency goals in the industrial sector. The intended impact is for the definition to serve as a foundational reference for future research and policy development.
Idaho National Laboratory (INL) is investigating the technical pathways to assist industrial heat and electricity users to meet their decarbonization goals through integration with advanced nuclear power plants (NPPs). This project will deliver a library of process models and accompanying documents that guide specific industries in choosing potential nuclear technologies based on their needs. Considerations in providing this guidance include specific hazards from the industrial facility, heat transport requirements and associated technologies, and feasibility with site-specific demand profiles. The library of facility process models will be based on real data from industrial facilities in the United States. The industrial processes will be identified in this project based on the following: (1) operational heat characteristics that nuclear systems can provide, (2) sufficient energy requirements to merit the capital investment for nuclear plant construction, and (3) environmental benefits of replacing existing energy production with carbon-free nuclear power. Other decarbonization opportunities considered are the addition of nuclear-powered electrolysis processes or high-temperature electric heating where the thermal requirements exceed nuclear generation conditions. In addition to assessing the technical feasibility, INL is evaluating the impact of hazards introduced by the industrial facilities on the siting requirements of advanced NPPs. Site characterization of an industrial plant is essential to determine the feasibility and suitable integration methods for each industry. The assessment of siting and technical data will reveal opportunities for a single-use nuclear integration as well as integration of multiple industrial facilities with a single NPP.
Industrial demands for highly motivated and competent technical personnel to carry forward with the technological goals of the US has posed a significant challenge to graduating engineers. While curricula has improved and diversified over time to meet these industry demands, relevant industry experience is not always available to undergraduates. The microsatellite development program at San Jose State University (SJSU) has allowed an entire undergraduate senior class to utilize a broad range of training and education to refine their engineering skills, bringing them closer to becoming engineering professionals. Close interaction with industry mentors and manufacturers on a real world project provides a significant advantage to educators and students alike. With support from companies and government agencies, the students have designed and manufactured a microsatellite, designed to be launched into a low Earth orbit. This satellite will gather telemetry for characterizing the state of the spacecraft. This will enable the students to have a physical check on their predicted value of spacecraft subsystem performance. Additional experiments will also be undertaken during the two year lifetime, including micro-meteorite impact sensing and capturing digital color images of the Earth. This paper will detail the process whereby students designed, prototype and manufactured a small satellite in a large team environment, along with the experiments that will be performed on board. With the project's limited funds, it needed the support of many industry companies to help with technical issues and hardware acquisition. Among the many supporting companies, NASA's space shuttle small payloads program could be used for an affordable launch vehicle for the student project. The paper address these collaborations between the student project and industry support, as well as explaining the benefits to both. The paper draws conclusion on how these types of student projects can be used by industry as a feasible resource for developing small platforms for space based experiments, as well as increasing the practical experience and engineering knowledge of graduating students. These benefits to industry and universities, can lead to a close working relationship between the two. These types of projects can facilitate the development of low-cost space rated parts to be used by the industry and university projects. It can also help with the understanding and use of acceptable risk non-space rated parts reducing the cost of the spacecraft. This will lead to the development of low cost platforms for space based experiments, providing research companies an inexpensive, long duration platform to conduct their in-space experiments, while better preparing engineering undergraduates for their transition into the work force.
Companies at risk of accidents caused by human error that result in catastrophic consequences include: airline industry mishaps, medical malpractice, medication mistakes, aerospace failures, major oil spills, transportation mishaps, power production failures and manufacturing facility incidents. Human Reliability Assessment (HRA) is used to analyze the inherent risk of human behavior or actions introducing errors into the operation of a system or process. These assessments can be used to identify where errors are most likely to arise and the potential risks involved if they do occur. Using the basic concepts of HRA, an evolving group of methodologies are used to meet various industry needs. Determining which methodology or combination of techniques will provide a quality human reliability assessment is a key element to developing effective strategies for understanding and dealing with risks caused by human errors. There are a number of concerns and difficulties in "tailoring" a Human Reliability Assessment (HRA) for different industries. Although a variety of HRA methodologies are available to analyze human error events, determining the most appropriate tools to provide the most useful results can depend on industry specific cultures and requirements. Methodology selection may be based on a variety of factors that include: 1) how people act and react in different industries, 2) expectations based on industry standards, 3) factors that influence how the human errors could occur such as tasks, tools, environment, workplace, support, training and procedure, 4) type and availability of data, 5) how the industry views risk & reliability, and 6) types of emergencies, contingencies and routine tasks. Other considerations for methodology selection should be based on what information is needed from the assessment. If the principal concern is determination of the primary risk factors contributing to the potential human error, a more detailed analysis method may be employed versus a requirement to provide a numerical value as part of a probabilistic risk assessment. Industries involved with humans operating large equipment or transport systems (ex. railroads or airlines) would have more need to address the man machine interface than medical workers administering medications. Human error occurs in every industry; in most cases the consequences are relatively benign and occasionally beneficial. In cases where the results can have disastrous consequences, the use of Human Reliability techniques to identify and classify the risk of human errors allows a company more opportunities to mitigate or eliminate these types of risks and prevent costly tragedies.
Concerns around water security in the United States have heightened the interest in industrial water treatment and reuse to improve water efficiency and operational reliability. Alongside nationwide efforts to expand industrial capacity, primary manufacturing sectors are adopting more resource-efficient technologies. This transition is expected to shift industrial water consumption patterns, driving the need for improved treatment and reuse practices. This study investigates opportunities for water use, treatment, and reuse in the iron and steel sector through a review of academic and industry literature and interviews with industry representatives. It identifies key challenges in water and wastewater management and outlines the conditions under which innovative treatment technologies could be deployed. Based on these insights, the study presents a practical water management action plan. Furthermore, it assesses water quality targets across different process operations, evaluates existing treatment technologies, and highlights challenges and opportunities for improvement relative to future performance expectations. Although water is often perceived as a low-cost commodity, industry feedback suggests that improvements in water use and treatment efficiency are typically prioritized only when they also reduce energy use, carbon emissions, or costs. This study advocates for a direct two-way partnership between industry and research audiences to bring their attention toward sustainable industrial water use, treatment, and reuse.
A six month program has been carried out to investigate various mechanisms for transferring technology to industry. This program has focused on transfer to the apparel industry through the Apparel Research Foundation. The procedure was to analyze the problem, obtain potentially relevant aerospace technology, and then transfer this technology to the industry organization. This was done in a specific case. Technology was identified relevant to stitchless joining, and this technology was transferred to the Apparel Research Foundation. The feasibility and ground rules for carrying out such activities on a broader scale were established. A specific objective was to transfer new technology from the industry organization to the industry itself. This required the establishment of an application engineering program. Another transfer mechanism tested was publication of solutions to industry problems in a format familiar to the industry. This is to be distinguished from circulating descriptions of new technology. Focus is on the industry problem and the manager is given a formula for solving it that he can follow. It was concluded that this mechanism can complement the problem statement approach to technology transfer. It is useful in achieving transfer when a large amount of application engineering is not necessary. A wide audience is immediately exposed to the technology. On the other hand, the major manufacturing problems which require a sophisticated technical solution integrating many innovations are less likely to be helped.
To support the goals of expanding our human presence and current economic sphere beyond LEO, a new plan was constructed for NASA to enter into partnerships with industry to foster and incentivize a new era of lunar industrialization. For NASA to finally be successful in achieving sustainable human exploration missions beyond LEO, lessons learned from our space history have shown that it is essential for current program planning to include affordable and economic development goals as well as address top national priorities to obtain much needed public support. In the last 58 years of NASA's existence, only Apollo's human exploration missions beyond LEO were successful since it was proclaimed to be a top national priority during the 1960's. However, the missions were not sustainable and ended abruptly in 1972 due to lack of funding and insufficient economic gain. Ever since Apollo, there have not been any human missions beyond LEO because none of the proposed program plans were economical or proclaimed a top national priority. The proposed plan outlines a new campaign of low-cost, commercial-enabled lunar COTS (Commercial Orbital Transfer Services) missions which is an update to the Lunar COTS plan previously described. The objectives of this new campaign of missions are to prospect for resources, determine the economic viability of extracting those resources and assess the value proposition of using these resources in future exploration architectures such as Mars. These missions would be accomplished in partnership with commercial industry using the wellproven COTS Program acquisition model. This model proved to be very beneficial to both NASA and its industry partners as NASA saved significantly in development and operational costs, as much as tenfold, while industry partners successfully expanded their market share and demonstrated substantial economic gain. Similar to COTS, the goals for this new initiative are 1) to develop and demonstrate cost-effective, cis-lunar commercial services, such as lunar transportation, lunar mining and lunar ISRU operations; 2) enable development of an affordable and economical exploration architecture for future missions to Mars and beyond; and 3) to incentivize the creation of new lunar markets through use of lunar resources for economic benefit to NASA, commercial industry and the international community. These cost-effective services would not only enable NASA to economically and sustainably achieve its human exploration missions to the Moon, Mars and beyond but it would also kickstart a new era of lunar industrialization. This paper will describe the goals, objectives and approach for implementing this new campaign of missions. It will also describe the potential benefits and progress that can be accomplished with these low-cost, Lunar COTS missions. Lastly, a preliminary economic analysis approach is proposed for understanding the cost and potential return on investment in the use of lunar resources to reach the goal of lunar industrialization and an expanded and sustainable human presence into cis-lunar space and beyond.
Industrial process heat (IPH) is one of the largest energy demands in U.S., representing about 10% of all domestic energy consumption. Fuel costs to generate this industrial process heat are generally a top three cost for industry, a major component in American manufacturing competitiveness. Roughly 60% of US IPH demand (about 6,500 TBtu annually) falls in the medium-temperature range of 100–250 °C. While concentrated solar thermal (CST) technologies can provide a cost-effective source of heat in this temperature range, solar intermittency limits their adoption in industries that operate 24/7. Element 16 Technologies, Inc. developed a low-cost sulfur thermal energy storage (TES) technology to bridge this gap by capturing excess solar heat during the day and dispatching it reliably during non-solar hours. The core innovation is the use of sulfur, an abundant, industrial waste byproduct that costs ten times less than molten salt used in commercial TES systems. The overall goal of the project was to advance the design and development of molten sulfur TES to a manufacturing-relevant prototype stage for solar industrial process heat applications, while establishing and validating a realistic pathway to commercial success. Key tasks included corrosion and mechanical durability testing to identify cost-effective materials, design investigations using physics-based simulation tools, techno-economic evaluations of system lifetime costs, and pilot-scale testing for performance verification. Corrosion testing of steel alloys under cyclic molten sulfur conditions showed that austenitic stainless steels in the 300 series performed particularly well, with no structural degradation of welds or joints. Thermal cyclic testing of pilot sulfur TES units up to 1.5 MWh quantified charge/discharge rates, heat losses, round-trip efficiency and validated the system's capability to operate effectively under intermittent charging conditions. A techno-economic model, informed by sulfur TES performance model validated using pilot test data, showed that hybrid solar+sulfur TES+NG boiler systems are economically competitive with incumbent natural gas boilers for multiple locations in the southwest US. In summary, this project established molten sulfur TES as a technically viable pathway to improve economic competitiveness of American manufacturing by lowering the cost of solar industrial process heat.
President George W. Bush and the Congress created the Commission on the Future of the United States Aerospace Industry to evaluate the current and future health of the industry as well as the challenges that lie ahead for the U.S. workforce and the economy. To accomplish our mission, we commissioned a study on the economic impact of the aerospace industry nationally and on a state-by-state basis, using the best available U.S. government data. This study sought to define the core of the aerospace industry. The resulting data represents that very core those jobs specifically tied to commercial and civilian aerospace. U.S. Aerospace and Aviation: A State-by-State Analysis examines the civilian and commercial aerospace and aviation industry by employment, wages, payroll, and establishments. The report found that the U.S. civilian and commercial aerospace and aviation industry employed over 2 million workers in 2001.
The United States (U.S.) is undergoing an energy transformation that will depend on continued U.S. innovation. Although U.S. industry has been foundational to the nation’s economic growth and prosperity, it has also given rise to decades’ worth of industrial pollutants in our air and water, which acutely impact the most vulnerable communities, as well as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions contributing to climate risk. At the same time, U.S. industry is facing growing competitive pressures. Global investors and financial regulations are increasingly focusing on emissions footprints, governments are developing emissions-based trade adjustments and procurement specifications, and downstream demand for low-carbon products is emerging. Developing cost-competitive solutions to meet these needs provides an opportunity to fundamentally transform U.S. industry and sharpen its competitive edge, while reducing the GHG emissions and adverse environmental and health impacts (see Figure ES-1). Innovation is central to this transformation. Pathways to Commercial Liftoff: Industrial Decarbonization, which provides a descriptive fact base on what is needed to reach commercial scale in the marketplace, estimates that over 60% of emissions reduction for the industrial sector will need to come from technologies that are still nascent today. This report, Transformative Pathways for U.S. Industry,3 focuses on the pathways that rely on the nascent and innovative technologies that were too early for consideration in the Pathways to Commercial Liftoff report. Targeted and sustained public and private investment in research, development, demonstration, and deployment is required to catalyze innovation and meet this moment.
Industrial conduit hydropower involves generating electricity from flowing water in existing industrial water supply, process flow, or wastewater discharges. The broader range of conduit hydropower involves powering existing water infrastructure in municipal, industrial, or agricultural systems. Whereas municipal and agricultural water systems have been retrofitted somewhat broadly in the United States, there are very few examples of industrial conduit hydropower. As stated in Kao et al. (2022), “conduit hydropower opportunities associated with industrial conduits are the least understood […] industrial developments are likely to be particularly efficient and cost-effective since they are typically eligible for on-site net-metering.” Therefore, additional insight into industrial opportunities is needed.