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    • Alternative Solvents through Green Chemistry Project

    Metadata Updated: April 10, 2026

    <p>The purpose of this project is to develop state-of-the-art, green precision cleaning technologies for NASA&rsquo;s 21<sup>st</sup> Century Launch Complex thus eliminating long-term environmental costs to the Program.&nbsp; Precision cleaning is of critical importance in the aerospace industry.&nbsp; Failure to clean to specified levels may result in problems ranging from impaired performance to catastrophic failure.&nbsp;</p><p>Of particular concern is the cleaning of systems containing strong oxidizers such as liquid oxygen (LOX) or hypergolic fuels.&nbsp; Currently, precision cleaning at Kennedy Space Center is performed using dual-solvent process in which the first solvent, Vertrel MCA, is used to clean the component and a second solvent, HFE-7100, is used as a final rinse and analytical test fluid.&nbsp; Highly fluorinated compounds such as those used in Vertrel MCA are extremely persistent in the environment and are potent greenhouse gases. Continued use of this or similar solvents will lead to high remediation costs that must be carried by the Program for years to come.</p><p>Historically, precision cleaning has used chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), such as Freon, because it was non-toxic and performed extremely wll.&nbsp; When Freon, and other CFCs, were banned due to their harmful environmental effects, new solvents were identified that were similar compounds but were not yet regulated.&nbsp; Eventually, these solvents also become regulated and unavailable for use.&nbsp; This project specifically did not consider halogenated solvents in order to find solvents or technologies that would not face future environmental regulations.</p>

    Access & Use Information

    Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

    Downloads & Resources

    References

    http://techport.nasa.gov/home
    http://techport.nasa.gov/doc/home/TechPort_Advanced_Search.pdf
    http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=6561
    http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=3456
    http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=3447
    http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=6584
    http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=6560
    http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=3448

    Dates

    Metadata Created Date November 12, 2020
    Metadata Updated Date April 10, 2026

    Metadata Source

    Harvested from NASA Data.json

    Other Data Resources

    Additional Metadata

    Resource Type Dataset
    Metadata Created Date November 12, 2020
    Metadata Updated Date April 10, 2026
    Publisher Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate
    Maintainer
    Identifier TECHPORT_11697
    Data First Published 2011-10-01
    Data Last Modified 2025-03-31
    Public Access Level public
    Bureau Code 026:00
    Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
    Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
    Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
    Harvest Object Id d947b775-dbdb-4111-a195-959117b2e429
    Harvest Source Id 58f92550-7a01-4f00-b1b2-8dc953bd598f
    Harvest Source Title NASA Data.json
    Homepage URL http://techport.nasa.gov/view/11697
    Program Code 026:000
    Related Documents http://techport.nasa.gov/home, http://techport.nasa.gov/doc/home/TechPort_Advanced_Search.pdf, http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=6561, http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=3456, http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=3447, http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=6584, http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=6560, http://techport.nasa.gov/fetchFile?objectId=3448
    Source Datajson Identifier True
    Source Hash 8de9ddd83e450d7e9e7926e714c3792b86ce5ad6d3326010019a2735beba70d3
    Source Schema Version 1.1
    Temporal 2011-10-01T00:00:00Z/2014-09-01T00:00:00Z

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