Capturing and Recycling of Xenon from A Cryopumped Vacuum Chamber

Abstract

o design and implement a cost effective method of capturing and recycling the xenon gas used as a propellant for various electric propulsion thrusters. This gas is trapped by the cryopumps as part of the high vacuum pumping system and is normally discarded through venting after the testing is completed. The xenon gas used in electric propulsion thrusters is a “green propellant” due to its inertness. Considerable cryogenic distillation is required to separate xenon from the other air constituents since it only comprises 8.7x10 % of the atmosphere by volume. Since this is a very low percentage there is high energy costs associated with this distillation process. The recycling of xenon gas will further reduce the environmental footprint of refining this rare gas from the atmosphere as well as decrease the costs associated with performing electric propulsion testing.