Introduction
NASA modernized the Chemical Equilibrium with Applications (CEA) software used in propulsion systems analysis and developed the CEA v3 version. Under NESC Activity TI-22-01730, the legacy Fortran code of CEA2 was transformed into an object-oriented package based on Fortran 2008, with up-to-date thermochemical data, expanded interface support and easier maintenance. The new version preserves compatibility with legacy CEA inputs while offering direct integration with Python, C, MATLAB and automated design studies.
Developments
Aiming to address the difficulties encountered in adapting CEA2, published in 2002, to modern engineering processes, CEA v3 supports Fortran, C, Python, MATLAB and Excel interfaces. New fuel and propellant components, including ADN, HAN, LMP-103S and n-Butanol, were added to the thermodynamic database.
Details
The software also supports negative reactant amounts, the representation of RP-1, Jet-A and JP series fuels, as well as analytical total derivatives that can be used in optimization and sensitivity analyses.
In representative tests, a single CEA v3 calculation ran approximately 40 percent slower than CEA2; however, the absolute difference per case was approximately 0.004 seconds. In contrast, the new architecture provides significant performance advantages in studies involving multi-case parametric sweeps, optimization and uncertainty analysis.