NASA now converts 98% of the space station’s urine and sweat into drinking water

NASA has reached a milestone in technology that could one day play an important role in extraterrestrial missions. This week, the space agency NASA announced that the Environmental Control and Life Support System on the International Space Station (ECLSS) is recovering 98 percent of all moisture released from the bodies of astronauts on the space station. Functionally, the system can be imagined to function in a manner similar to the “Steelsuits” in the fictional “Dune”.

to report Android, one part of the environmental control and life support system on the International Space Station uses “advanced dehumidifiers” to absorb moisture from the bodies of the space station crew during their daily tasks. Another subsystem, called the “urine processor assembly”, recycles the astronauts’ urine using vacuum distillation. According to NASA, the distillation process separates the water and brine from the urine, which still contains recoverable H2O.

The American space agency has just started testing a new device that can extract the remaining water in the brine of urine and body sweat, and with the help of this system, 98% of water recycling has become possible in the International Space Station. Previously, the water recycling rate in this station was around 93-94%.

Christopher Brown “This achievement is a very important step forward in the evolution of life support systems,” said a member of the team that manages the ISS’s life support systems. Suppose 100 liters of liquid is collected in the station. We lose 2 liters of it and the other 98% remains for us. “Maintaining this cycle is a great achievement.”