Just make sure you go before you leave earth.
What wimps. No wonder we’re making such slow progress in space.
12 thoughts on “Geez, People”
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Just make sure you go before you leave earth.
What wimps. No wonder we’re making such slow progress in space.
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HAH!
I really like the cocktail glass with olive picture. It adds a nice touch.
A quarter of a billion dollars for a pee-machine. Robots don’t need to pee. Send them.
They bring “waste” back to earth for “processing”?
I guess putting it into a bag and chucking it into the atmosphere to just burn up is TOO cost effective?
As the Moon vs. Mars people (both of whom seem to hate humans doing anything else in Earth orbit) fight it out, I’ve argued that we need more emphasis on important ‘destination agnostic’ technologies like propulsion and…this. (that is, various aspects of life-support)
It’s a pretty basic requirement that we have to get good at, no matter where we go. I mean, if you can’t expect to pee with confidence in LEO, how ya gonna do it halfway to Pluto…?
I’m only sorry Al Shepard isn’t still around to see this…
The stuff in my spam trap includes offers that might help.
Oh, that’s not what you meant. Sorry.
Yes I definitely agree with Frank. Quarter of a billion dollars and what looks like half a ton for something that should be the size and cost of a good portable toilet. It need be little more than a miniature desalinization machine and this is one technology that would also actually have huge application on Earth.
Spending ~$20,000/kg to ship mass to LEO and then bringing it back??? What a huge waste. It should be stockpiled on orbit. Carbon and water are very precious commodities close to Earth. In time it should be converted back into food, so sad that closing this loop is not being worked on. This should be one of the first priorities of the ISS. It would free up so much launch payload for other things and make huge progress towards sustainable off world survival. We can not expect to go to the Moon or Mars without first developing such recycling systems in LEO.
“But, daaaad, I didn’t have to go before we left Earth…”
“Don’t make me come back there. I will turn this shuttle around, so help me…”
Fortunately, mom has a solution.
Meh, NASA doesnt pick up innovation from its own ranks ? ? I mean, didnt their astronaut Lisa Nowak demonstate a reliable method to do long trips without .. you know, coffee breaks.
IIRC most of the water expended goes out in sweat and exhaled air rather than urine. So it is more profitable to collect that and the system which does it is still working. But yeah for long term presence in space, e.g. to travel to Mars, a closed loop system is necessary to reduce the amount of consumables.
No most of the water expended does not go out in sweat and exhaled air rather than urine. It is almost a 50/50 split.
NASA is working on closed loop life support, but this is what you learn the first time you do something. Think for a minute, if this was easy don’t you think the Russians would be doing it. While they did have urine processing on MIR, they had so much trouble with it that they did not pursue it for ISS.
This urine processor has recovered over 1500 kgs (or $30 Million at the $20000/kg or $75 Million at the current Russian price of $50000/kg if you prefer) of urine that would have been dumped into a Progress and dumped overboard. This water if not recovered would have to be brought up by the Russians or the Shuttle at the expense of other cargo.
Gives a whole new meaning to being pissed about waste in government programs.