Modeling for evaluating efficiency of spacecraft power systems

Abstract

Power system is a crucial part of spacecrafts providing the power support to nearly every other subsystem. The power system configuration is impacted by factors such as amount of power required, type of orbit, duration of the mission, and physical constraints of mass volume. The major functions of Power system encompasses power generation, energy storage and power processing. The organization of control and management circuits to carry out these functionalities is termed as Power Control and Management (PCM). The power system functionality is complex in nature with different functional elements working under different operating conditions. Estimation of composite efficiency is one of the vital parameter for selection of an optimum configuration in achieving the desired mission goal. Intuitive methods are generally used for finding out a suitable configuration with its associated elements. However availability of elemental efficiency models facilitate the bench marking of different options. Hence, a comprehensive methodology to estimate major loss factors has been formulated. The overall efficiency of power system configuration is evaluated based on the series parallel connection of modeled sub system elements.