ABSL to Help NASA Return to the Moon
29th June 2006
ABSL Space Products (formerly AEA Technology Space) will continue its successful working relationship with NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) with the $1.7M award of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) Lithium-ion battery contract.
The LRO is a mission of high importance to meet the exciting goals of NASA’s new vision for space exploration. In order to send manned crews to Mars and beyond, NASA first intends to return to the Moon to prove the new systems and technologies that are required for the longer journeys ahead. Furthermore, in order to safely conduct these necessary lunar precursor missions, a series of unmanned spacecraft will collect data under the Robotic Lunar Exploration Program (RLEP). As such, the RLEP will be the first crucial step on man’s path to other planets in our solar system and LRO will be the first RLEP mission.
The LRO battery will employ the same Lithium-ion cell that has been baselined for other NASA GSFC programs and has already clocked up over 2,500 cell years of operation in space without failure. The LRO battery is similar in construction to that employed on SDO with three stacked decks of cells. The battery has a capacity of over 110Ah supplied at a nominal voltage of 28V.
Rob Spurrett, Director of ABSL Space Products commented: “We are delighted to be working with NASA once again. NASA GSFC are our largest North American customer but also have had the privilege to work with Johnson Space Center, the Jet Propulsions Laboratory and Glenn Research Center. The award of this contract fully justifies our ongoing activities to extend US-based personnel and capabilities.”
Gopal Rao at NASA GSFC said: “LRO is a mission that will accumulate a high number of charge/discharge numbers over the 5-year mission target duration. The proven performance of ABSL batteries in the high cycle operating environment of Low Earth Orbit, together with the quantity of lifetest data available on their cell, was crucial to their award of the LRO contract.”
Other recent successes for ABSL Space Products include the lift-off in March 2006 of a Pegasus rocket which launched the three NASA GSFC Space Technology 5 spacecraft that were powered by ABSL Lithium-ion hardware. ABSL has also delivered flight batteries for the THEMIS program and is building 120Ah batteries for the Geostationary Solar Dynamic Observatory (SDO) mission. The next chapter appears to be starting for ABSL with major development contracts from the European Space Agency (ESA) for LIDAR technology.
ABSL is recognised as the world leader in the supply of Lithium-ion batteries for space applications with over sixty Lithium-ion battery contracts for spacecraft and launch vehicles. ABSL supplied the first rechargeable Lithium-ion battery flown in space and a total of nineteen spacecraft are now flying using its Lithium-ion technology. More than 2500 cell-years of space operation have been built up without a single failure.
--Ends--
For media information please contact:
Rob Spurrett (UK) T: +44 1865 408 747 E:
Chris Pearson (USA) T: +1 303-241-1229 E:
Notes To Editors:
ABSL Space Products (formerly AEA Technology Space)
ABSL Space Products (formerly AEA Technology Space) ABSL Space Products is a trading name of ABSL Power Solutions Limited, which is one of nine companies acquired by Coller Capital from AEA Technology plc in October 2005. This change offers ABSL Space Products a huge opportunity to grow and develop the business to achieve its ambitions.
ABSL Space Products is the world leader in the supply of Lithium-ion batteries for space applications with Lithium-ion battery contracts for over sixty spacecraft and launch vehicles . ABSL supplied the first rechargeable Lithium-ion battery flown in space and a total of nineteen spacecraft in orbit are now using ABSL Lithium-ion battery technology.
ABSL has built up a global customer base, winning major contracts from NASA, ESA, and major prime manufacturers in North America, Europe and the rest of the world.
ABSL has demonstrated in orbit the most reliable Lithium-ion product available for the space market by clocking up over 2500 cell years of space operation without failure.
ABSL has pioneered a battery design concept that is uniquely flexible. As well as being selected for very large space battery applications (such as the 400KWh unit for the NASA Space Shuttle), ABSL’s “small-cell” concept has become the natural choice for many satellite applications.
ABSL has been active in the space industry since the 1960s during the early days of ion-thruster development. During the 1980s, ABSL was the largest non-US subcontractor to the United States Strategic Development Initiative (SDI). More recently, effort has been focused on its power and optical products, such as LIDAR and infrared calibration systems.
ABSL is working on the next generation of Lithium-ion technology to increase battery level energy density to over 150Wh/kg.
The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter
The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) mission emphasizes the overall objective of obtaining data that will facilitate returning men safely to the Moon where testing and preparations for an eventual manned mission to Mars will be undertaken.
The measurement investigations that respond to each of the following measurement sets that have been defined as having the highest priority:
- Characterization of deep space radiation in Lunar orbit
- Geodetic global topography
- High spatial resolution hydrogen mapping
- Temperature mapping in polar shadowed regions
- Imaging of surface in permanently shadowed regions
- Identification of near-surface water ice in polar cold traps
- Assessment of features for landing sites
- Characterization of polar region lighting environment
Once launched, payload instruments will be in a power-off state during the launch and injection phase. The cruise phase begins when the spacecraft separates from the launch vehicle and ends prior to Lunar orbit injection (LOI). The cruise phase lasts approximately TBD days, depending on the launch date, trajectory, and specific orbit selection.
After achieving the final mapping orbit, the LRO baseline mission is nominally 1 Earth year at 30-50 km circular, polar orbit. This may be followed by an extended mission of up to 5 years in a low maintenance orbit that allows continued observations and possibly the use of LRO as a communication relay satellite.
The LRO spacecraft will be a 3-axis stabilized platform with both stored data and real-time downlink capabilities. The current estimate for the downlink data rate is 100 Mbps with delivery of up to 900Gb/day of observation data to earth.
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC)
The NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is located in a Maryland suburb outside of Washington, DC. It is NASA’s largest Field Center and has scientists and engineers dedicated to learning and sharing their knowledge of the Earth, solar system, and Universe. The mission of the NASA GSFC is to expand knowledge of the Earth and its environment, the solar system and the universe through observations from space. NASA GSFC is committed to excellence in scientific investigation, in the development and operation of space systems and in the advancement of essential technologies.
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