An introduction to pressurized volumes in space

It is recommended that designers of pressurized space habitations follow a three-step process in the preliminary design process. They must begin by defining the environment in which the habitat is to operate and the functions to be performed within the habitat; they can the proceed with design in view of the five requirements of failure-resilience, reliability, habitability, transportability, and constructibility. The final preliminary design step is a refinement of the basic concept by taking environmental and functional requirements into consideration in all requisite detail. It is only at this last stage that the designer may note whether a basic configuration is altogether unworkable.