NASA Offering $3 Million for Answer to Astronaut Poop Problem

Poop is a problem in space. Specifically, what to do with it. That’s why NASA has launched the LunaRecycle Challenge, a plea for someone, anyone, to help them figure out how to reuse astronaut poop, among other gross dispelled human waste.

There are currently 96 bags of human waste on the moon. They were left behind by Apollo astronauts who planted the American flag, played golf on the moon’s surface, then left their shits everyone in perhaps the most American display of dominance over a land mass ever recorded.

NASA wants astronauts to stay on the moon for much longer, especially if moon bases are in the plans. Leaving poops laying around a place isn’t an option when that place is your home and office.

Just as how the European Space Agency held a contest challenging the private sector to come up with a device or process that could make frozen moon water drinkable, NASA will reward $3 million to anyone who can figure out a way to reuse astronaut poop, pee, and vomit.

NASA Offering $3 Million to Recycle Astronaut Poop on the Moon

To be clear, NASA is not looking for storage solutions. If that were the case, they would just store our vacuum-sealed poop in packing cubes or they’d bring some shovels with them so they could bury it like they were campers protecting themselves from bears.

Ideally, they want solutions that will turn human waste into something useful like energy, water, or maybe even food.

According to NASA’s press release, the goal is “sustainable space exploration.” The competition’s first round is already underway, with teams submitting their best ideas for turning human waste into not-waste.

The top proposal gets a $3 million reward and the eternal glory of having solved a problem that, no matter how immature and scatological, the ramifications of which will echo throughout humanity’s spacefaring future.