Engineering Papers⌕ Search

SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “Lessons learned”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 667 records · Page 37
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2024

Lessons Learned from Three Agrivoltaic Installations in New Jersey

Agrivoltaics is a new technology that has the potential to positively impact commercial farming by combining agricultural practices with the generation of solar energy. While some yield reduction is to be expected, resulting from less sunlight reaching the plant canopy and ground occupied by support structures, the generated electricity provides a low-risk supplemental income to farmers. In order to combine farming with electricity generation, agrivoltaic systems use a lower ground coverage ratio compared to normal solar farms and the PV panels are often mounted higher above the ground in order to facilitate the movement of agricultural equipment and to reduce the contrast between shaded and non-shaded areas. With funding provided from the state of New Jersey and the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (NJAES), we designed and installed three unique agrivoltaic research systems at Rutgers/NJAES farms. These projects were recently completed and are generating electricity that is exported to the grid. This paper discusses the lessons we have learned along the way, including all the steps necessary to see an agrivoltaic project through to completion.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2024

Lessons Learned from Three Agrivoltaic Installations in New Jersey

Agrivoltaics is a new technology that has the potential to positively impact commercial farming by combining agricultural practices with the generation of solar energy. While some yield reduction is to be expected, resulting from less sunlight reaching the plant canopy and ground occupied by support structures, the generated electricity provides a low-risk supplemental income to farmers. In order to combine farming with electricity generation, agrivoltaic systems use a lower ground coverage ratio compared to normal solar farms and the PV panels are often mounted higher above the ground in order to facilitate the movement of agricultural equipment and to reduce the contrast between shaded and non-shaded areas. With funding provided from the state of New Jersey and the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (NJAES), we designed and installed three unique agrivoltaic research systems at Rutgers/NJAES farms. These projects were recently completed and are generating electricity that is exported to the grid. This paper discusses the lessons we have learned along the way, including all the steps necessary to see an agrivoltaic project through to completion.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
NASA NTRS1997

Infusion of Autonomy Technology into Space Missions: DS1 Lessons Learned

The impact of infusing breakthrough autonomy technology into a flight project was a big surprise. Valuable technical and cultural lessons, many of general applicability when intorducing system-level autonomy, have been learned by infusing the Remote Agent (RA) into NASA's Deep Space 1 (DS1) Spacecraft.

Autonomy↗
NASA NTRS2005

Team Collaboration: Lessons Learned Report

An Agency team collaboration pilot was conducted from July 2002 until June 2003 and then extended for an additional year. The objective of the pilot was to assess the value of collaboration tools and adoption processes as applied to NASA teams. In an effort to share knowledge and experiences, the lessons that have been learned thus far are documented in this report. Overall, the pilot has been successful. An entire system has been piloted - tools, adoption, and support. The pilot consisted of two collaboration tools, a team space and a virtual team meeting capability. Of the two tools that were evaluated, the team meeting tool has been more widely accepted. Though the team space tool has been met with a lesser degree of acceptance, the need for such a tool in the NASA environment has been evidenced. Both adoption techniques and support were carefully developed and implemented in a way that has been well received by the pilot participant community.

Arterberrie, Rhonda Y.↗
NASA NTRS2005

Lessons Learned From Developing Three Generations of Remote Sensing Science Data Processing Systems

The Biospheric Information Systems Branch at NASA s Goddard Space Flight Center has developed three generations of Science Investigator-led Processing Systems for use with various remote sensing instruments. The first system is used for data from the MODIS instruments flown on NASA s Earth Observing Systems @OS) Terra and Aqua Spacecraft launched in 1999 and 2002 respectively. The second generation is for the Ozone Measuring Instrument flying on the EOS Aura spacecraft launched in 2004. We are now developing a third generation of the system for evaluation science data processing for the Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) to be flown by the NPOESS Preparatory Project (NPP) in 2006. The initial system was based on large scale proprietary hardware, operating and database systems. The current OMI system and the OMPS system being developed are based on commodity hardware, the LINUX Operating System and on PostgreSQL, an Open Source RDBMS. The new system distributes its data archive across multiple server hosts and processes jobs on multiple processor boxes. We have created several instances of this system, including one for operational processing, one for testing and reprocessing and one for applications development and scientific analysis. Prior to receiving the first data from OMI we applied the system to reprocessing information from the Solar Backscatter Ultraviolet (SBUV) and Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) instruments flown from 1978 until now. The system was able to process 25 years (108,000 orbits) of data and produce 800,000 files (400 GiB) of level 2 and level 3 products in less than a week. We will describe the lessons we have learned and tradeoffs between system design, hardware, operating systems, operational staffing, user support and operational procedures. During each generational phase, the system has become more generic and reusable. While the system is not currently shrink wrapped we believe it is to the point where it could be readily adopted, with substantial cost savings, for other similar tasks.

Tilmes, Curt↗
DOE OSTI2020

First Ever Polymer Flood Field Pilot to Enhance the Recovery of Heavy Oils on Alaska North Slope – Producer Responses and Operational Lessons Learned

The US Department of Energy and Hilcorp Alaska, LLC are jointly cosponsoring a field pilot project entitled “First Ever Field Pilot on Alaska’s North Slope to Validate the Use of Polymer Floods for Heavy Oil Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR).” The objective of this pilot is to perform a field experiment to validate the use of an advanced polymer flooding technology to unlock the vast heavy oil resources on Alaska North Slope (ANS). Two pairs of horizontal injection and production wells have been deployed in an isolated fault block of the Schrader Bluff heavy oil reservoir at the Milne Point Field to conduct a polymer flood pilot which was designed to acquire field performance data to optimize polymer flood design in the Schrader Bluff heavy oil reservoirs on ANS. Hydrolyzed polyacrylamide (HPAM) polymer injection started on August 28, 2018 using a custom made polymer mixing and pumping unit. Polymer solution properties such as concentration, viscosity, and filter ratio, have been closely monitored and adjusted as necessary. Operational procedures have been improved to ensure adequate injectivity and polymer propagation through the formation. Oil and water production is tested frequently to monitor water cut performance, and produced water is sampled and analyzed for polymer content. Tracers were pumped pre and post polymer injection startup to compare polymer flood breakthrough timing and sweep efficiency. Polymer injectivity of the horizontal wells drilled in the Schrader Bluff NB sand is found to be sufficient to replace the reservoir production voidage although there were some declines as high viscosity polymer swept the near wellbore region. Production data show significant reduction in water cut and the oil production rate has stabilized. No polymer production has been confirmed from the two horizontal producers after 22 months of polymer injection into the two supporting horizontal injectors. Tracer data show very low sweep efficiencies with waterflood alone, whereas significant improvement has been achieved with polymer flood. Many operational lessons have been learned and improvements have been made regarding polymer mixing, pumping, and onsite quality control, particularly in a challenging Arctic environment. Adequate polymer injection rate can be achieved with diligent monitoring and quality assurance of the properties of the injected polymer solution.

Ning, Samson↗
NASA NTRS1988

ACES program - Lessons learned

The ACES Program involved the experimental evaluation of three LSS (large space structures) control design techniques at the LSS GTF (ground test facility) at NASA/MSFC. The three techniques were developed under the ACOSS (active control of space structures) Program specifically for application to LSS. The techniques included FAMESS (filter accommodated model error sensitivity suppression), HAC/LAC (high authority control/low authority control), and positivity. Some of the lessons that have been learned during the course of the ACES program are examined.

Jones, Victoria L.↗
NASA NTRS2020

Lessons Learned from Recent Space Flight Assessments

This paper highlights four space flight assessments, each with an important lesson. The first assessment points to the challenge of material substitution for weight saving. Space Shuttle’s external tank stringers were changed from Al 2024 to Al 2090 without comprehensive analysis. Lack of understanding the low Short-Transverse (S-T) strength associated with Al 2090 led to widespread cracking. The second assessment addresses the failure to understand that time-dependent relationships and loading interactions of multiple disciplines can lead to non-conservative results. An aerodynamic test article of the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) Launch Abort System (LAS) was analyzed for worst-case single discipline loads, showing positive structural margins. When disciplines were combined with time dependent loading, the analysis resulted in negative margins. The third assessment highlights the pitfalls of putting blind trust in historical architecture. The MPCV re-entry heat shield adopted the Apollo design approach despite fundamental differences between the two designs (e.g., the underlying substructure design, material differences, scale, and geometry). Manufacturing resulted in cracking along seams of the cured MPCV heat shield and produced lower mechanical properties of the Avcoat witness panels. Subsequently, the design was changed to a block architecture, which introduced unperceived technical, cost, and schedule risk. The fourth assessment shows how the lack of a comprehensive investigation of design modifications and inappropriate Finite Element Analyses (FEA) can lead to trouble. A mass reduction campaign eliminated highly critical internal struts on the ISS Node-1 pressurized module based on inadequate and uncorrelated FEA. High strains were noted and ignored as a modeling aberration. A system level high fidelity FEA discovered large plastic strains in the gussets of all four radial ports. These findings initiated a full-scale test campaign, new test correlated assembly-level FEA, and significant design modifications.

James P Smith↗
NASA NTRS1983

The Space Shuttle focused-technology program - Lessons learned

The results of a focused technology program (FTP), its management structure, the development of the Space Shuttle, and lessons applicable to future space programs such as a space station are discussed. A committee was formed by NASA in 1969 to define the technologies necessary for a reusable spacecraft. Basic and applied research assessments were featured at the beginning of the process. Working groups were established to cover all necessary areas, e.g., Operations, Structures and Materials, Aerothermodynamics, etc., and tasks were distributed to appropriate NASA centers. Funding was drawn from existing budgets. The FTP proceeded successfully because of an understanding of the respective roles of industry and government, the willingness of industry to invest early in a new technology, and the unclassified status of information generated by the program. The in-house design and technology transfer methods that brought the project to a technology demonstration phase are explored, noting the necessity for users to take part in the development within their field.

Fitzgerald, P. E., Jr.↗
NASA NTRS2006

Near-Miss Evaluation Bias as an Obstacle to Organizational Learning: Lessons from NASA

After the Shuttle Columbia catastrophe, the investigation board (CAIB) stated that NASA needs to develop a "learning culture", meaning a capability to learn from past failures by understanding the technical and organizational causes of these mistakes (CAIB report, 2003). While many organizations learn from obvious failures, we argue that it is harder for organizations to learn from near-miss events (i.e., situations where a failure does not occur but nearly did), because these near-misses are processed as successes. For the shuttle program, prior debris problems could have caused a similar failure as on the Columbia mission except that the large pieces missed the highly sensitive portions of the orbiter. This acceptance of foam debris was adopted as a normal occurrence by the shuttle program managers similar to the problems at the time of the Challenger Disaster (detailed in Vaughan, 1996). We extend that work to show that an outcome bias influences people's evaluation of project managers, such that managers of failed missions were perceived more poorly than managers who made the same decisions but whose mission ended in either success or a near-miss. The similarity of ratings between the near-miss and success condition imply that even when a problem occurs that is clearly linked to prior managerial decisions, if the project is not harmed because of good luck, that manager is not held accountable for faculty decision making and neither the individual manager nor the organization learn from the experience potentially increasing the likelihood of a failure in the future.

Dillon, Robin L.↗
NASA NTRS2004

Challenger and Columbia Lessons Learned

The Space Shuttle Challenger and Columbia accidents resulted in tragic loss of life and national assets, and investigations into both accidents produced important lessons to prevent future accidents

Hoffman, William C., III↗
NASA NTRS1985

Measuring the software process and product: Lessons learned in the SEL

The software development process and product can and should be measured. The software measurement process at the Software Engineering Laboratory (SEL) has taught a major lesson: develop a goal-driven paradigm (also characterized as a goal/question/metric paradigm) for data collection. Project analysis under this paradigm leads to a design for evaluating and improving the methodology of software development and maintenance.

Basili, V. R.↗
NASA NTRS1986

Lessons learned in creating spacecraft computer systems: Implications for using Ada (R) for the space station

Twenty-five years of spacecraft onboard computer development have resulted in a better understanding of the requirements for effective, efficient, and fault tolerant flight computer systems. Lessons from eight flight programs (Gemini, Apollo, Skylab, Shuttle, Mariner, Voyager, and Galileo) and three reserach programs (digital fly-by-wire, STAR, and the Unified Data System) are useful in projecting the computer hardware configuration of the Space Station and the ways in which the Ada programming language will enhance the development of the necessary software. The evolution of hardware technology, fault protection methods, and software architectures used in space flight in order to provide insight into the pending development of such items for the Space Station are reviewed.

Tomayko, James E.↗
NASA NTRS1994

Lessons learned from selecting and testing spaceflight potentiometers

A solar array drive (SAD) was designed for operation on the TOPEX/POSEIDON spacecraft that was launched in August, 1992. The experience gained in selecting, specifying, testing to failure, and redesigning its position sensor produced valuable lessons for future component selection and qualification. Issues of spaceflight heritage, cost/benefit/risk assessment, and component specification are addressed. It was found that costly schedule and budget overruns may have been avoided if the capability of the candidate sensors to meet requirements had been more critically examined prior to freezing the design. The use of engineering models and early qualification tests is also recommended.

Iskenderian, T.↗
DOE OSTI2023

Tutorial: Lessons Learned for Behavior Analysts from Data Scientists

Big data is a computing term used to refer to large and complex data sets, typically consisting of terabytes or more of diverse data that is produced rapidly. The analysis of such complex data sets requires advanced analysis techniques with the capacity to identify patterns and abstract meanings from the vast data. The field of data science combines computer science with mathematics/statistics and leverages artificial intelligence, in particular machine learning, to analyze big data. This field holds great promise for behavior analysis, where both clinical and research studies produce large volumes of diverse data at a rapid pace (i.e., big data). This article presents basic lessons for the behavior analytic researchers and clinicians regarding integration of data science into the field of behavior analysis. We provide guidance on how to collect, protect, and process the data, while highlighting the importance of collaborating with data scientists to select a proper machine learning model that aligns with the project goals and develop models with input from human experts. Here, we hope this serves as a guide to support the behavior analysts interested in the field of data science to advance their practice or research, and helps them avoid some common pitfalls.

42 ENGINEERING↗
NASA NTRS1994

Lessons Learned form Selecting and Testing Spaceflight Potentiometers

A solar array drive (SAD) was designed for operation on the TOPEX/POSEIDON spacecraft that was launched in August of 1992. The experience gained in selecting, specifying, testing to failure, and redesigning its position sensor produced valuable lessons for future component selection and qualification.

TOPEX/POSEIDON redesigning SAD component specifica↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Visualizing Geospatial Data through ESRI Story Maps for Earth Science Education: Lessons Learned from My NASA Data

For 20 years My NASA Data (MND) has curated NASA Earth science data and provided the data to educators in engaging learner-centered resources. MND has recently featured story maps as an innovative way to engage students in NASA Earth data. A story map is a cloud-based lesson that engages the learner in interactive geospatial maps using NASA data, and other multimedia content, text, and tasks that can be seamlessly incorporated in classroom instruction. This immersive technology eliminates the need for the user to move among tricky interfaces to access and visualize Earth science data, and no special software is required to be downloaded. Each story map integrates data from different NASA satellite missions, retrieved from Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAACs). Story maps also employ data analysis tools, such as time series options and swipe tools that allow learners to view and analyze relationships between scientific variables. MND has produced 25 story map lesson plans on the topics of air quality, the urban heat island effect, Earth’s energy budget, phytoplankton distribution, hurricane formation, solar eclipses, ocean circulation patterns, sea ice extent, and volcanic eruptions. Nine of them are extended story maps and written in the 5E format, which is internationally recognized as best practice based on how children learn science. Each story map resource is developed by the MND team featuring a GIS programming specialist, a lead scientist, and educational specialist/s to ensure the context, content, and methods are scientifically and educationally sound. The MND story maps are written for middle and high school science teachers and students as they connect with the Earth Systems Science phenomena featured in the Next Generation Science Standards. Each story map includes supporting resources for smooth integration in the classroom. During Fiscal Year 2023, The My NASA Data website received over 100,000 story map engagements during. These metrics highlight the interest in story maps as an Earth Science educational resource.

Desiray Wilson↗