Bruce Sterling: Since you're a solar power engineer, let's deal first with your professional role up there, shall we? 

Nicole Stott: Well, I’m not a solar power engineer. I studied aeronautical engineering at university. But I think I can answer the questions. 

BS: What's the station's electrical situation like? 

NS: Amazing! It’s a beautiful, self-sufficient system. The ultimate “green,” “renewable-energy,” “self-sustainable” solar-powered system.  

BS: Do you have plenty of juice, or do you get brownouts?

NS: We have plenty of juice. There have been failures that have brought some sections of equipment down, but these have been very rare. Typically if power is taken away from equipment it’s because it’s part of some planned work. As the users of the system, we have a fairly structured way of managing day to day with the electrical system. Most equipment is powered or plugged in for a significant amount of time, so we don’t have to move things around a lot. For new equipment or something that is just going to be used temporarily, we have a “plug-in plan,” which basically gives us the required outlet or a list of acceptable outlets to use so that we don’t overload anything.  

BS: Any fuse or battery problems? 

NS: Doesn’t happen a lot, but every now and then we’ll get a trip of an RPC (Remote Power Controller), which is basically a switch that provides the power to downstream equipment and also provides the fault protection like a circuit breaker or a fuse would.  

BS: Lots of exposed wiring? 

NS: Yes, unfortunately a lot of our interior decor is “enhanced” by exposed cable runs.  We try to make it as neat as possible, but sometimes it just doesn’t look too pretty.  And cable management in zero-g can be challenging.

BS: Since the International Space Station is "international," what kind of wall plugs do you use? Three prong, two prong, octopus plugs, power strips, AC/solar DC, what gives up there? 

NS: We have a couple different types of electrical connectors. There are common types of connectors used on the US modules and common types on the Russian modules.  In some cases we have adapters that we can use for connections between the modules. All of the connectors are multi-pin connectors and don’t really look like anything I’ve seen in a home on Earth. All of our electrical power is DC.  124V DC on the USOS modules and 28 V DC on the Russian modules.

The ISS is an amazing example of solar power in action.  We have 8 large solar array wings out at the ends of the space station. These wings can be programmed to automatically rotate as necessary to the best angle to collect the solar energy. This energy is either sent directly to power equipment or is sent to batteries for storage for when we aren’t in sunlight. It starts out at 160V DC at the solar arrays and is converted to 124V DC, and in some cases, for particular equipment, it is converted again to 28V DC.  We have a series of converters-distribution boxes between the solar arrays and the equipment to ensure that we safely get the power to the different equipment.  

BS: The station has modules that were designed in Russia, the United States, Italy, even Japan. Can you tell the difference at a glance?  

NS: Definitely. The space station is comprised of the Russian segment—made up of the Service Module, “Zarya”; Docking Module, “Pirs”; FGB, “Zvezda”; and the Soyuz vehicles—and the US segment (made up of the US Laboratory “Destiny” module; Node 1, “Unity,” and Node 2 ,“Harmony”; the Airlock “Quest” module; and also includes the Japanese “Kibo” Laboratory modules and the European “Columbus” Laboratory module. (By the way, except for Columbus, we as a crew never refer to the modules by these names. Don’t know why, but for us if we say something like “I’m going to the Lab” or “I’m going to the SM”, everyone knows you’re going to the US Lab module or Russian service module.)

It is definitely easy to tell the difference between the US segment and the Russian segment. The US segment has a much newer, more modern look with lots of white panels, while the Russian segment has an older, less sterile look to it—maybe not the prettiest place on station, but it’s a testament to the tried and true with a history going back to the early Salyut and Mir space station days, and most important, it is a very comfy, cozy place, with walls covered in a soft, Velcro pile-like fabric. You feel “at home” in the Russian segment.  In addition to the way the modules look, you can also distinguish the modules by smell.  Pleasant in all modules, but just different.

BS: Do cosmonauts and astronauts tend to glide into their own national areas?

NS: Not on purpose, with the exception that the Russian cosmonauts sleep in the Russian modules and the US, European, Canadian and Japanese astronauts sleep in the US modules and that the cosmonauts are responsible for the Russian systems and the astronauts are responsible for the US systems. Throughout the day as we work, everyone is spread across the station, but we always spend meal times together. Typically breakfast and lunch in the Russian Service Module and dinner in the US Node 1.

Meal times are a really important part of our day as a crew; it’s a lot like bringing your family together. The times around the galley tables in both the Service Module and Node 1 are where we solve the world’s problems, solve the space program’s problems, solve each other’s problems, listen to good music, eat good food, improve our vocabulary in other languages, and laugh a lot.

We have a wide variety of good food up here to choose from. All of the partner countries are providing food items now and there is some really yummy stuff.  In addition, we receive a limited number of “bonus” food packs that include special food items that we have specifically chosen (e.g. favorite candy, packaged foods, teas). One of our European crewmembers brought some really delish things in his bonus pack: Italian sausage, Brie, pate, lump crabmeat. And the best part is: He shares! 

BS: Is it weird to spend a lot of time floating around Cyrillic or kanji writing? 

NS: The official language on board the station is English, so you see English everywhere. In the Russian modules, you see both English and Russian. The only kanji on board is some fun welcome signs in the Japanese modules. It isn’t weird at all to see the Cyrillic—in fact, after all the training in Russia we’ve done, it would be weird to not see it.

BS: You yourself seem to spend a lot of time diving or living underwater. Is the space station more like a submarine, or like a flying vehicle? 

NS: This is where windows are important. When you’re inside the station and can’t see out a window, it feels more like a ship or submarine or even a stationary station, but when you look out a window or even catch a glimpse out a window you know you are in a flying vehicle, you know you are in a space craft, and you know you are moving fast. We orbit once around the Earth every 90 minutes, sunrise and sunset every 45 minutes, 17500 mph!  

BS: I notice the ISS has a ship's bell. Do people treat it as a ship? Does it feel like a vehicle or more like a stationary station? 

NS: Generally treat the station like a ship. We have the ship’s bell and we use it in the Navy tradition to welcome and bid farewell to crewmembers and to sound out when there is a change of command. One of our recent crewmembers even assembled a small model of a ship while he was here and we’ve placed it in the area of the bell.  As I’m floating in front of my computer right now, basically just holding myself with one foot behind a foot restraint, the way your body just naturally floats up and down is very similar to the roll of gentle waves on a ship. Interesting because it’s your body in zero gravity that’s giving you the sensation; it’s not anything that the space station is doing. 

BS: Can you tell the new parts of the station apart from the older parts of the station, and if so, how?

NS: Guess like any place it is the simple wear and tear that can distinguish the older parts from the new, but there is also a “new car smell” when a new module is attached—a very clean smell that stays around for a while. Some of the older modules also show their history through the mission patches that have been placed within them by previous station or shuttle crewmembers. 

BS: It would be great to hear about any wear patterns that reflect the traces human beings always leave in a home.  Hand-written labels, fridge magnets, welcome mats, duct tape, foam padding on metal parts where people bump their heads, posters, decals, wise-cracking graffiti, barracks pin-ups, spittoons, any of that. The human dwelling element.  

NS: There are several places across the different modules where “human traces” can be found. We all try to make our sleep quarters as homey as possible with pictures of our families and pets and with special things from home: toys our kids gave us to have with us, books, hobby supplies. We as crews have also established traditions for putting crew patches on display; there is a panel in Node 1 with patches stuck to it from every shuttle crew that’s ever visited the station. One of my favorite areas that has the human touch is in the Russian Service Module where there is a classic picture of Yuri Gagarin, an Orthodox Russian crucifix, and picture of [Russian space theorist Konstantin] Tsiokovsky. And then there are some of the science experiments that help bring more life to the station: plant growing, mice, protein crystals, Earth observation photography.  

BS: Do any parts of the station have nicknames—not acronyms like "the LHMC" but names like "the Hole" or "the Lounge"?  

NS: Sadly no. But on second thought, I guess it’s really not sad; it’s just that we’ve just never really done it. For most of us, it is just so cool to get to spend time here that we’re happy to just call a module by the module. There are some fun acronyms though that we pronounce as words for different places. One that’s a favorite of mine in particular is ACY (Cyrillic), pronounced ah-soo. This is the Russian acronym for the toilet.  

BS: Does the station itself have a name? 

NS: The commander of Expedition 1, the first crew to live on station, designated the name of the crew as “Alpha” and somewhere along the way the media reported that this was the name of the space station. From that point on, there has been some general use of Alpha as the name. But most crews don’t refer to the station that way—we don’t—because it was never intended as the station name. When we call the Mission Control Centers in Houston, Huntsville, Germany, and Japan, we say “Houston, Station…” or “Houston, ISS…” and if we’re calling Mission Control in Moscow we say “Moskva, MKC…” (MKC is Cyrillic for ISS). 

BS: Do people call the ISS "her"? 

NS: Yes. Guess it goes along with the ship thing.

BS: What does it sound like, smell like, and taste like? 

NS: Sound: Not as noisy as I expected it to be. There is, however, a constant sound of fans running (because there are lots of fans running). I expect that when I get back on Earth I will appreciate places without fans running 24 hours a day—the whole sound of silence thing.

Smell: Pleasant across the station. Like clean, air-conditioned rooms. Different in the different modules, but pleasant everywhere. One thing about smell that was a complete surprise to me was something that’s referred to as the “smell of space.”  This is not a smell that’s inside the space station. This is a smell that comes from things that have been exposed to the vacuum of space. For instance, you smell it when you open up the airlock to let astronauts back in after a space walk or you smell it on the hatch of a new module that’s docked to station. It’s a very distinct smell—best thing I can compare it to is a mild version of the smell of an overheating car engine. Don’t know what causes the smell—and it’s not often that we get to smell it—but it’s definitely there.

Taste: Guess when I think of the “taste” of station, I think again of the great meals and the camaraderie around the galley tables.