Cascade Distillation System Design for Safety and Mission Assurance

Per the NASA Human Health, Life Support and Habitation System Technology Area 06 report “crewed missions venturing beyond Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) will require technologies with improved reliability, reduced mass, self-sufficiency, and minimal logistical needs as an emergency or quick-return option will not be feasible”.1 To meet this need, the development team of the second generation Cascade Distillation System (CDS 2.0) chose a development approach that explicitly incorporates considerations of safety, mission assurance, and autonomy. The CDS 2.0 preliminary design focused on establishing a functional baseline that meets the CDS core capabilities and performance. Now in the critical design phase, focus is being placed on incorporating features through a deliberative process of establishing the system’s failure modes and effects, identifying mitigation strategies, and evaluating the merit of the proposed actions through analysis and test. This paper details the results of this effort on the CDS 2.0 design.