Personal Heat Pump

Aspen Systems proposes to develop a small portable personal heat pump system that may be used by Air Force flight line maintenance and aircrew personnel to combat heat stress and cold weather exposure. Aspen Systems is uniquely qualified to develop a miniature personal heat pump. We have successfully designed, fabricated, tested, and licensed a small rotary compressor that literally fits in the palm of your hand. Our compressor weighs just over one pound and measures about 2" in diameter by 2.5" long. It is capable of providing up to 300 Watts (1024 Btu/h) of cooling in a 120°F ambient environment. The Phase I program successfully demonstrated the feasibility of utilizing our miniature compressor in a vapor compression heat pump system to provide an acceptable solution for personal heating and cooling in the USAF application. The primary objective of the proposed Phase II program is to optimize the system components while developing the base technology into a personal heating and cooling product that will be ready for production at the end of the Phase II program.