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Life cycle assessment of the Athena X-ray integral field unit

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Abstract

The X-ray Integral Field Unit (X-IFU) is the high-resolution X-ray spectrometer to fly on board the Athena Space Observatory of the European Space Agency (ESA). It is being developed by an international Consortium led by France, involving twelve ESA member states, plus the United States. It is a cryogenic instrument, involving state of the art technology, such as micro-calorimeters, to be read out by low noise electronics. As the instrument was undergoing its system requirement review (in 2022), a life cycle assessment (LCA) was performed to estimate the environmental impacts associated with the development of the sub-systems that were under the responsibility of the X-IFU Consortium. The assessment included the supply, manufacturing and testing of sub systems, as well as involved logistics and manpower. We find that the most significant environmental impacts arise from testing activities, which is related to energy consumption in clean rooms, office work, which is related to energy consumption in office buildings, and instrument manufacturing, which is related to the use of mineral and metal resources. Furthermore, business travels is another area of concern, despite the policy to reduced flying adopted by the Consortium. As the instrument is now being redesigned to fit within the new boundaries set by ESA, the LCA will be updated, with a focus on the hot spots identified in the first iteration. The new configuration, consolidated in 2023, is significantly different from the previously studied version and is marked by an increase of the perimeter of responsibility for the Consortium. This will need to be folded in the updated LCA, keeping the ambition to reduce the environmental footprint of X-IFU, while complying with its stringent requirements in terms of performance and risk management.

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No datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to the X-IFU sub-system leads that contributed to the data collection used for the LCA, that led to the results presented above. We are also grateful to Bruno Millet (CNES) for supporting the objective to make the development of the instrument more sustainable.

This work was funded by CNES, CNRS and CEA in France and by internal resources elsewhere.

We thank the referee for comments on the paper.

DB wishes to thank Maeva Voltz, Zoé Massida and Maélyss Larrieu for their support along different phases of this project.

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  1. All authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planétologie, 9 Avenue du Colonel Roche, Toulouse, 31028, France

    Didier Barret, Jürgen Knödlseder, François Pajot, Laurent Ravera & Natalie Webb

  2. Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales, 18 Avenue Edouard Belin, Toulouse, 31401, France

    Vincent Albouys

  3. Scalian, 14 Rue Paul Mesplé, Toulouse, 31100, France

    Xavier Loizillon

  4. Istituto di Astrofisica e Planetologia Spaziali, Via Fosso del Cavaliere 100, 00133, Roma, Italy

    Matteo D’Andrea & Claudio Macculi

  5. Université Paris Cité, CNRS, CEA, Astroparticule et Cosmologie (APC), F-75013, Paris, France

    Florence Ardellier & Damien Prêle

  6. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, 8800 Greenbelt Rd, Greenbelt, 20771, MD, USA

    Simon Bandler

  7. SRON, Netherlands Institute for Space Research, Niels Bohrweg 4, 2333 CA Leiden, The Netherlands

    Pieter Dieleman & Luc Dubbeldam

  8. Département des Systèmes Basses Températures, CEA-Grenoble, 17 avenue des Martyrs, 38054 Grenoble cedex 99, France

    Lionel Duband

  9. INAF, Osservatorio di Astrofisica e Scienza dello Spazio, via Gobetti 93/3, 40129, Bologna, Italy

    Eduardo Medinaceli

  10. Centre Spatial de Liège, Liège Science Park, Avenue du Pré-Aily, 4031, Angleur, Belgium

    Tanguy Thibert

  11. INTA, Crtra de Ajalvir km 4, 28850, Torrejon de Ardoz, Madrid, Spain

    Isabel Vera Trallero

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  1. Didier Barret
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All authors whose names appear on the submission 1) made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data; 2) drafted the work or revised it critically for important intellectual content;3) approved the version to be published; and 4) agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

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Correspondence to Didier Barret.

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Barret, D., Albouys, V., Knödlseder, J. et al. Life cycle assessment of the Athena X-ray integral field unit. Exp Astron 57, 19 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10686-024-09939-7

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