On Monday, November 28, 2016 at 4:53:30 PM UTC+13, Fred J. McCall wrote:
JF Mezei wrote:

On 2016-11-27 01:17, Fred J. McCall wrote:

cellulose, minerals, and indigestible fats. You're not going to turn
it into methane without giving up a lot of the recovered water and

Ok, that is a fair point. I had not considered that aspect.


So now, the question becomes whether the ISS program would start to
develop and test systems that can process solid human waste (they
already have one for urine) to recover as much as possible from it.


That's a long, long way down the road, if ever. First they need to do
a lot of work here on Earth.


"turning it into food/veggies" is basically composting the waste. And
guess what, composting requires O2 and generates methane.


Guess what? I don't think that's what they're talking about.



Not much it can be used for, which is why they throw it away on ISS.


They throw it away on ISS because they don't have any system to process
it ...


Because there's nothing useful it can be 'processed' into.


... and with only 3 to 6 occupants who get monthly deliveries by
Progress/Dragon/Cygnus (and formerly Shuttle, HTC and ATV).


Irrelevant. Do you seriously think processing ****e will
substantially reduce resupply requirements? It won't, which is why
they just toss it.


--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn

This is a good reference;

https://books.google.co.nz/books?id=...dition&f=false

All wastes, including plastic, cotton and paper wastes, are easily recycled using super-critical water oxidation. This produces CO2 from every carbon source which is reduced to methane and water using hydrogen. Methane is easily reduced to elemental carbon recovering the hydrogen. Carbon may be used for odour absorption. Carbon may also be used in a micro-reactor system to produce beta glucans which are then assembled 3D printer fashion into any fabric or plastic desired.