4 ms·
Best practices are that you really shouldn't. The potential value of human waste as an additive to growing food is (vastly) overwhelmed by the potential for pa
by Baeocystin 4y ago
Best practices are that you really shouldn't. The potential value of human waste as an additive to growing food is (vastly) overwhelmed by the potential for pathogen spread, pharmaceutical pollution, the whole nine yards.
The longest-running project I'm aware of is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milorganite https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milorganite , which is similar to what you are asking, if you want to go for a deeper dive in the subject.
- deepdriver 4y agoThanks! Had never heard of Milorganite. My interest is purely one of curiosity, specifically how waste might be recycled in a Mars or Moon colony. The Chinese regenerative life support project Lunar Palace 1 claims 41% nitrogen recapture from solid waste, using a "bioreactor" i.e. flippable compost bin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuegong-1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuegong-1 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27912029/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27912029/ It's unclear from the published results whether the crew ate food grown from this compost, or just measured the output's nitrogen content.
- actionfromafar 4y agoIn Sweden "milorganite" like processes are as far as I know fairly common, but there is controversy around heavy metal and antibiotics content.