NIST Heat Flow Meter

This is a Sources Sought Notice ONLY.  Requests for copies of a solicitation will not receive a response.  The purpose of this notice is to obtain information regarding the availability and capability of qualified business sources. This notice is strictly for market research and information purposes only. Your responses will assist the Government in determining the appropriate acquisition method, including whether a set-aside is possible.

NIST is seeking responses from all responsible business concerns under the associated NAICS code for this effort, 334516 (Analytical Laboratory Instrument Manufacturing)
 

This Notice is for planning purposes only and is not a Request for Proposal or Request for Quotation or an obligation on the part of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) for conducting a follow-on acquisition.  NIST does not intend to award a contract on the basis of this Notice, or otherwise pay for the information requested.  No entitlement or payment of direct or indirect costs or charges by NIST will arise as a result of submission of responses to this Notice and NIST use of such information. 

 

NO SOLICITATION DOCUMENTS EXIST AT THIS TIME.

Background:

The Heat Transfer and Alternative Energy Systems (HTAES) Group within the Energy and Environment Division of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) contributes to the advancement of measurement science needed to achieve net-zero energy, high-performance buildings.  One key component to achieving net-zero energy is advanced building energy technologies, especially thermal insulation for building envelope system.  Accordingly, the focus area for the thermal insulation project within the group is to improve the tools used for measuring and evaluating thermal properties of various insulation materials and building envelopes. Understanding the thermal properties of various innovative thermal insulation and building envelope materials at various size scales provides important data to achieve high-performance buildings. A Heat Flow Meter (HFM) is an apparatus that is used for measuring thermal conductivity of insulation materials and is considered an important industry standard tool for thermal measurements along with other equipment such as the Guarded Hot Plate. The HTAES group will utilize the requested instrument for investigating the thermal properties of various thermal insulations, and phase change materials. The contact force measurement capability of the requested HFM will provide a similar test condition with NIST GHP instruments and will therefore complement other in-house measurements. With the requested HFM, more rapid investigations on GHP test conditions can be developed without utilizing NIST GHPs and big scale specimens. Furthermore, specific heat capacity of thermal insulation and PCM materials will be a new thermal measurement property, which is often used as a material parameter for energy storage applications.

Requirement:

The system shall meet or exceed the minimum requirements identified below. All items must be new.  Used or remanufactured equipment will not be considered for award. Experimental, or prototype will not to be considered.  The use of “gray market” components not authorized for sale in the U.S. by the proposer is not acceptable.   All line items shall be shipped in the original manufacturer’s packaging and include all original documentation and software, when applicable.

The Contractor shall provide one (1) Heat Flow Meter system controlled by a customized software, developed by the contractor, to be installed in a single computer for measuring thermal properties of materials. The HFM system shall meet or exceed the following minimum specifications:

1. The HFM system must be compliant with the measurement methods outlined in the ASTM C518 (C518 Standard Test Method for Steady-State Thermal Transmission Properties by Means of the Heat Flow Meter Apparatus (astm.org)) and ISO8301 (ISO 8301:1991 – Thermal insulation — Determination of steady-state thermal resistance and related properties — Heat flow meter apparatus)  for thermal conductivity measurement.

2. The HFM system shall include heat flux transducers on the upper and lower plates. The HFM system shall be controlled by a single computer for measuring thermal data of materials. The HFM system shall satisfy the following requirements:

a. The HFM system must provide thermal resistance, thermal conductivity, and specific heat capacity of solid materials as digital data format compatible with Microsoft Excel.

b. The areal size of the samples for thermal conductivity measurements must include 300 mm (length) by 300 mm (width) as a single piece (i.e. no surrounding materials).  

c. Measurable ranges of the thermal conductivities for bulk materials with a thickness of 15 mm shall be from 0.005 W/mK to 1 W/mK or broader.

d. Force to clamp specimens must be a minimum 1.8 kiloNewtons (kN) and the force history must be exported in digital format compatible with Microsoft Excel.

e. The upper and lower plate temperatures shall be set from - 25 C to 85 C or broader for the thermal conductivity measurements

f. The plate motion in the sample holder shall be motorized by inputting a desired sample thickness, and inputting a desired clamping load simultaneously.

g. The measured specific heat capacity shall be provided both per unit mass and per unit volume (volumetric). 

3. The HFM systems shall be controlled by a single computer with a single data acquisition program, which shall be provided and installed by the Contractor. 

QUESTIONS REGARDING THIS NOTICE

Questions regarding this sources sought notice may be submitted via email to Mr. Marvin Jean, Contract Specialist, at marvin.jean@nist.gov. Questions are due by or before 12:00 PM ET on August 1, 2024. Questions will be anonymized and answered via sources sought notice amendment following the question submission deadline.

RESPONSE INSTRUCTIONS

All responsible business sources able to provide the services described above are asked to email a response to Mr. Marvin Jean, Contract Specialist, at marvin.jean@nist.gov by or before 12:00 PM ET on August 5, 2024.

Please include the following information in the response:

1. 1. Name of company authorized to provide services, along with their address and a point of contact for the company (name, phone number, and email address).
   2. The company’s primary NAICS, size classification, and socio-economic status (i.e., Small Business, Woman Owned Small Business, Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business, etc.).
   3. Specific description of capabilities in relation to the product specifications provided herein.
   4. Information on any GSA Federal Supply Schedules (FSS) or other Government-wide contracts through which the company offers these services, if applicable.
   5. Any other relevant information that is not listed above which the Government should consider.

Responses are limited to a maximum total of ten (10) pages in MS Word or searchable PDF format.
 

IMPORTANT NOTES

This notice is not to be construed as a commitment by the Government to issue a solicitation or ultimately award a contract. Responses will not be considered as proposals or quotes. No award will be made as a result of this notice. The Government will not be responsible for any costs incurred by the respondents to this notice.

The Government reserves the right to use information provided by respondents for any purpose deemed necessary and legally appropriate. No proprietary, classified, confidential, or sensitive information should be included in your response; however, NIST will recognize as restricted or proprietary data which is clearly marked such.