Recycled urine to quench astronaut’s thirst in Space Station

A trip in space may actually seem to be out-of-this-world for all of us. But for the natives of space, it isn’t as hunky-dory as it seems to us, sitting here on this planet and sipping onto a glass of clean water. Residents of Space Station will have to quench their thirst by sipping on to their urine, which of course will be recycled to make it 100% potable. A $250 million system is exclusively designed to ionize, filter, distill, and oxidize the wastewater. It was reported that folks aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour will be handing off to their Space Station colleagues this water regeneration system. As of yet, the astronauts will only be testing the system and not drinking on this trip. When on earth, the system showed excellent results, but NASA wants to be sure that it works, as designed, in a zero-gravity environment too.

To date, the Space Station has had the luxury of getting water deliveries from newly arrived Space Shuttles. But the Shuttle program is slated for retirement after 2010, and that means that no more water carrier from earth.
Endeavour astronaut Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper has convincingly quoted “Some people may think it’s downright disgusting, but if it’s done correctly, you process water that’s purer than what you drink here on Earth.”
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