Keeping Handheld Electronics Working in Arctic Cold

The challenge

Airline ground crews in arctic regions depend on handheld electronic devices for tarmac operations. In extreme cold those devices stopped working, which disrupted operations.

What we did

We built a first-principles model of the devices' heat balance, covering heat transfer, insulation and energy use, and then ran experiments to find the physical parameters that mattered most. Those results shaped a battery-powered electronic heater that keeps the devices warm for as long as a shift requires and works with commodity hardware. We designed the electronics and built and tested several prototypes in live conditions.

The result

The prototypes met the project's objectives in live tests, and the cost of goods came in at a fraction of the client's budget. Orders for the heater passed 1,000 units.

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