AIRCRAFT CABIN AIR MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

Abstract

The present disclosure makes use of the fact that passengers have ways of adjusting the temperature in their immediate environment or indicating their level of comfort or discomfort and uses information about the passengers' use of the temperature control capabilities in their immediate environment and/or indications of their level of comfort/discomfort as an input to a controller of an environmental control system (ECS) to automatically adjust the ECS supply air temperature set point.

Claims

1. A cabin temperature control system comprising an environmental control system (ECS) configured to provide clean air to an aircraft cabin at a predetermined temperature based on a set point, the ECS configured to receive one or more inputs indicative of a passenger comfort level and to adjust the set point based on the one or more inputs.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising a set point controller configured to determine the adjustment to the set point based on the one or more inputs and to provide the adjusted set point to the ECS.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more inputs are provided by one or more micro-climate conditioning modules in the aircraft cabin.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the one or more micro-climate conditioning modules include one or more in-seat micro-climate conditioning modules.

5. The system of claim 3, wherein the one or more micro-climate conditioning modules include one or more heating or cooling devices located under a passenger seat.

6. The system of claim 3, wherein the one or more micro-climate conditioning modules include one or more heating or cooling devices located above a passenger seat.

7. A method of controlling air temperature in an aircraft cabin, whereby air is provided to the cabin from an environmental conditioning system (ECS) at a predetermined temperature based on a set point, and wherein the set point is adjusted based on one or more inputs to the ECS indicative of passenger comfort.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the one or more inputs include one or more inputs from one or more micro-climate conditioning modules indicative of the temperature setting thereof.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising adjusting the set point of the ECS based on a number of passengers using an additional cooling device.

10. The method of claim 7, further comprising adjusting the set point of the ECS based on whether the set point has been previously adjusted.

11. The method of claim 7, further comprising the steps of: i) determining whether a number of passengers in the aircraft cabin operating micro-climate conditioning units to provide cooling to their environment is below a predetermined threshold; ii) if not, decreasing the set point; iii) if so, determine whether the set point was previously decreased; iv) if so, not adjusting the set point; and v) if not, increasing the set point.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising repeating steps i) to v) periodically.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0014] FIG. 1 is a simple schematic of an air temperature control system in an aircraft cabin.

[0015] FIG. 2 is a flow diagram of cabin air control according to the present disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0016] As discussed above, environmental control systems (ECS) for conditioning the air in the cabin of an aircraft, are designed to provide air at a temperature deemed to ensure passenger comfort. Designers also need to take into account, however, the fuel consumption of the ECS, which is providing air of the optimal temperature. The selected set point temperature for the cabin air provided by the ECS has to therefore be a compromise between an ‘ideal’ temperature for optimal passenger comfort and the associated fuel consumption. The selected set point will lie somewhere between the minimum and maximum permitted cabin temperature.

[0017] Even for an ‘optimal’ set point temperature, some passengers will require more heating or cooling in the environment of their seat. Providing passengers with individual so-called micro-climate conditioning modules in or around their seat will allow then to have some control over the air temperature around them. On a larger scale, if a number of passengers have this capability, it may be possible to set the set point of the ECS at a higher temperature that would normally be considered optimal for passenger comfort, thus requiring less cooling and, therefore, reducing fuel consumption by the ECS.

[0018] The present disclosure makes use of the fact that passengers have ways of adjusting the temperature in their immediate environment or indicating their level of comfort or discomfort, and uses information about the passengers' use of the temperature control capabilities in their immediate environment and/or indications of their level of comfort/discomfort as an input to a controller of the ECS to automatically adjust the ECS supply air temperature set point.

[0019] If, for example, few passengers are selecting additional cooling at their seats although they have the capability to do so, this can be an indication that the cabin temperature set point of the ECS could be increased, allowing the temperature in the cabin to be higher (and thus reducing fuel consumption) since the passengers are then able to use their local devices to provide additional cooling if needed.

[0020] FIG. 1 is a schematic view of an aircraft cabin air conditioning system having an ECS 1 for providing air to the cabin at a temperature according to a set point. In the example shown, the aircraft is also provided with a plurality of micro-climate conditioning modules 2, 3, n associated with individual seat areas. These may be in-seat micro-climate conditioning modules, but may also be provided under or above the seats. Such modules may be provided for each seat, or for several seats for example one per row, and may be provided in all areas of the cabin or only selected areas. Different seats or areas of the cabin could be provided with different types of conditioning modules. For example, some seats could be provided with in-seat modules, whereas others may only be provided with overhead blowers.

[0021] According to the disclosure, a set point controller 10 is provided to determine the set point for operation of the ECS 1. The set point controller 10 receives inputs from the micro-climate conditioning modules 2, 3, n and adjusts the set point of the ECS based on those inputs. It is also feasible that the controller 10 could be provided with other inputs indicative of passenger comfort or discomfort, for example, from passenger's own mobile telephones, or from switches or sensors in the aircraft that interact with the passengers, or from manual input by passengers and/or crew. Micro-climate conditioning modules add to the weight of an aircraft and the electric power use. These must be factored into the design and the effect of the additional weight and power consumption on fuel consumption must be taken into account. Smaller heat exchangers could be used in such modules to reduce weight and the associated fuel penalty in certain circumstances.

[0022] An example of the set point control methodology will now be described with reference to FIG. 2.

[0023] In this example, the system first determines the number of passengers NUM_PAX, at step 100. At step 101, the system determines the number of passengers that have set their micro-climate conditioning units 2, 3, n to a high cooling setting, NUM-HC. NUM-HC is divided by the number of passengers and then compared, at step 102 with a predetermined threshold THR.

[0024] If more than the threshold number of passengers have selected a high cooling setting (‘no’) this is an indication that the general cabin temperature is too high and the ECS set point is decreased, at step 104.

[0025] If the number of passengers that have selected a high cooling setting does not exceed the threshold THR, (‘yes’), the system branches to step 103 where it is determined whether or not the set point was decreased in the previous cycle through the algorithm. If it was (‘yes’), then the current set point is maintained (step 105). The set point has already been decreased and not too many people are using the high cooling setting so no further change is made.

[0026] If, however, the set point had not been decreased in the previous cycle (‘no’ at 103), the cabin temperature set point of the ECS is increased (step 106). This is because the set point is providing air at a temperature that does not require additional cooling by many passengers — there is therefore scope to slightly increase the cabin temperature as there are still enough people with unused capacity to provide further cooling in their own environment. By increasing the set point, fuel savings can be made.

[0027] By only increasing the set point if during the previous cycle the set point had not been decreased, oscillations in set point selection are avoided. If the temperature was decreased in a previous cycle and then increased, it is likely that the passengers with the high cooling selection that triggered the first reduction would trigger a new decrease at the next cycle.

[0028] The methodology is performed in a loop that is executed periodically.

[0029] The threshold can be selected based on a range of factors including the type of aircraft, number of passengers, flight path, flight time, etc.

[0030] Step 101 in this example involves determining how many passengers have selected a high cooling setting at their seat. This is just one example of an input that is indicative of passenger comfort/discomfort. In general terms, this indicates how many passengers find the current settings sub-optimal for their comfort. This can be indicated in different ways, as described above, depending on the types of conditioning modules or other input means available to the passengers. The inputs here can be of the same or different types.

[0031] The system of the present disclosure has the benefit of enabling reduced fuel consumption by the ECS since the set point can be increased without impacting the thermal comfort of the passengers and so the amount of ram air penalty and conditioning thereof is reduced.

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