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Arthur C. Clarke, pre-eminent science fiction author of “The Sentinel,” which was the basis of “2001: A Space Odyssey,” famously said to Walter Cronkite that “There is no such thing as waste, there are only resources we are too stupid to know how to use.”  Well, we are getting better and more creative with every passing year.  And that’s what this article is about.

Plans have been underway for many years to establish a space exploration colony on Mars.  The goals of the colony would be to compare the geological evolution of Earth to Mars, search for bacteria and other microscopic life forms, and demonstrate the feasibility of sustaining human life in a foreign and hostile environment.  This is a massive undertaking, and NASA engineers and scientists along with other members of the international space community have been considering the problem for a long time.  At this point, it may prove possible to send an exploratory colony to Mars in 2012, and it would be scheduled to remain there for 600 days.  The future is almost here.

As you can imagine, it is difficult to get materials to Mars and back, and everything has to be recycled.  And we mean everything.  An undertaking of this magnitude requires that every contingency be evaluated in advance.  Waste Recycling Systems (WRS) are one such thing.  The purpose of WRS is to recycle human waste of every stripe to provide an ongoing supply of agricultural water, deliver potable water as an emergency back-up system, and augment the growth of plant and animal products.  How would all this be done? Here’s how.

The crew would have to grow their own food, produce their own water and oxygen, and provide their own protection against the perils of the environment.  Among many other things, they would require a biomass recycling system to recapture human waste and reprocess it for later use elsewhere.  Most of this material would be captured in their space suits.  Carbon dioxide from breathing would be converted to water and oxygen, for example.  And much like our existing sewage treatment plants but with many more refinements, other body evacuations such as urine and feces would be collected and reused as well.  Some of this would be converted to energy for heating, and much of this material would provide liquid and compost fertilizer for plant life.  One of the primary crops they would cultivate is mushrooms since they require no light and thrive in cool temperatures.

At Russell Reid, we know that America is learning not to be wasteful with waste.  Technologies to reconvert waste are under development, and they are likely to be widely used in industrial processes in the coming decade.  As it turns out, this may not only improve commerce and be environmentally friendly, it may help lead the way in space exploration as well.  Who knew?