Advanced insulation breakthrough from space industry

Privately held Quest Product Development of Denver, Colorado and Ball Aerospace have won a NASA grant to develop an advanced thermal insulation that could have commercial applicability.

Integrated Multilayer Insulation (IMLI) is initially being developed for long manned space exploration missions. It's expected to be two to three times better insulation than the current best spacecraft insulation known.

Conventional multilayer insulation, used to preserve rocket fuels such as liquid oxygen and hydrogen, or keep sensitive cryogenic instruments operating, is based on fifty year old technology. It is labor intensive to produce and requires a heavy vacuum shell.

"A thermal insulation system with one-third the weight of conventional cryogenic insulation - and two-fold better performance - would be revolutionary," said Gary Mills, Ball Aerospace Principal Engineer and inventor of the new technology.

Quest will use micro-molding to create an engineered polymer substructure that is expected to be an extremely effective thermal barrier.

The company says its technology could also be used to insulate cryogenic dewars for industrial, research and medical uses, and to insulate commercial tanks and containers to preserve produce during transportation.

Another potential IMLI use is super-insulation for home refrigerator/freezers and water heaters. A one inch thick panel could have an insulation "R-value" of 3,600, compared to polymer foam insulation with an R-value of 7, the company claimed.

Quest believes that refrigerators or freezers with IMLI insulation would reduce their energy usage by 50%, and water heaters could use 18% less energy. The company's calculations suggests that implementing IMLI for these two home appliances could result in annual energy savings of $8B in America alone.

Quest Product Development is a high-tech research and development company, and manages the development process to bring new technologies from universities and companies to market.

Ball Aerospace is a leading company with 50 years experience in space system and related technologies development.