NASA Moves 8.5-by-24-Foot Wastewater Lab to North Dakota for Moon and Mars Tests
Updated
Updated · NASA · Jun 2
NASA Moves 8.5-by-24-Foot Wastewater Lab to North Dakota for Moon and Mars Tests
2 articles · Updated · NASA · Jun 2
Summary
Grand Forks will host NASA’s latest life-support trial after a mobile wastewater treatment facility built at Kennedy Space Center arrived at the University of North Dakota for habitat-style testing.
The trailer-based system will be linked to the university’s lunar/Martian analog habitat, where students and NASA researchers will measure reliability, crew-training needs and performance under planetary-like operating limits.
Three bioreactors keep urine, graywater, fecal and food waste separate, then recover water and nutrients to feed a vertical hydroponic garden and prepare resources for reuse.
NASA says the work supports Artemis and longer Mars missions by reducing dependence on Earth resupply, with lessons potentially feeding into higher-fidelity yearlong Mars analog tests at Johnson Space Center.
With the ISS water system often failing, can this more complex recycler truly guarantee astronaut survival on the Moon?
This system turns waste into 3D-printing material. How soon could astronauts build lunar bases using their own recycled waste?
Beyond space missions, could this mobile water recycler become a vital tool for Earth's own water-scarce communities?
Achieving 95% Water Recovery: NASA’s Divergent Deployable Wastewater Treatment Facility for Sustainable Lunar and Martian Habitats
Overview
The Divergent Deployable Wastewater Treatment Facility (DDWTF) was deployed at the University of North Dakota in June 2026 through a NASA EPSCoR grant. Integrated with a lunar and Martian analog habitat, the system uses a specialized bathroom interface with a urine-diverting toilet to separate waste streams at the source, sending them to targeted treatment systems. Ali Alshami’s team is developing advanced membrane-based separation technologies for future integration, aiming to boost water recovery, improve contaminant removal, and strengthen system resilience. These innovations are essential for supporting sustainable, long-duration human missions beyond Earth.