Integrated thermal anti-icing and environmental control system

Abstract

An integrated thermal anti-icing and environmental control system for a gas turbine powered aircraft uses hot high pressure bleed air from the turbine compressor to de-ice the wings and the engine air inlet, and supplies conditioned air for the aircraft cabin. In order to minimize total bleed air requirements and maximize heat recovery, bleed air exhausted from the inlet anti-icing system is passed sequentially through other systems. In this invention, the usual pre-cooler unit and the associated heat sink are eliminated and the pre-cooling function is performed within the inlet anti-icing system, preferably through the use of a double skin heat exchanger contained within the lip of the inlet. One embodiment of this system includes a closed-loop liquid anti-icing system for acoustic rings mounted in the inlet wherein the liquid is heated by passing the bleed air through a heat exchanger mounted immediately downstream of the inlet anti-icing system.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.