The CO2 deposition system (CDep) addresses the challenge of an extremely reliable, low maintenance cabin air revitalization system which is required for crewed deep space exploration missions. A cold surface is generated and maintained to selectively deposit CO2 from cabin air. An ionic liquid humidity control system was developed to supply continuous dry air to CDep to provide purer CO2 downstream product which also helps in reduction of required power to generate the cold surface. This system consists of hollow fiber membranes where ionic liquid flows through the lumen side and air flows through the shell side. The system is expected to remove 96% of the humidity from cabin air with minimal power consumption. This paper presents the experimental system design and validation of a numerical study. The experimental validation of this system was conducted using different variable parameters such as inlet relative humidity, flow rate of air and ionic liquid. The results of this humidity control subsystem will have direct impact on the operational design of full-scale system.
Jagtap et al. (Sun,) studied this question.