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ESDMD #0702: Waste Management

Managing trash and waste streams without contaminating the vehicle or the planetary surface, and recovering water, gases, plastics and metals from waste and from end-of-life elements such as landers (bin 3, rating 21 of 57). The current state of the art is "Abandoning all waste on the surface or in designated orbit" (Tech gaps spreadsheet, ESDMD #0702).

Quotations below are from row ESDMD #0702 of the tech gaps spreadsheet unless marked otherwise. ADD Rev C's Appendix D prints the same table for this gap, and it matches the row field for field (ADD Rev C, p. 235).

Description

"A comprehensive ability to manage waste streams is lacking. Trash disposal can release viable and non-viable microorganisms, water, and other volatiles and can contaminate the local environment. Additionally, a variety of resources and residuals are available from elements at end-of-life (e.g., landers) and in trash/waste including plastics, metals, water, and gases among others. If recovered, these resources may be recycled (water, oxygen, etc.) or repurposed (plastics, metals) for new applications. This includes technologies such as trash to gas, material sorting, trash material separation/extraction, in-space manufacturing, liquid/gas recovery, trash compaction, biological processing of waste, resource scavenging, long-term storage, etc."

Impacts and benefits: "Closing this gap may reduce amount of delivered logistics and volume of waste. Improved waste disposal technologies may mitigate the release of microorganisms and volatiles preventing contamination of science samples and complying with planetary protection protocols."

Current state of the art

"Abandoning all waste on the surface or in designated orbit."

Performance target

Moon/Mars: "Solutions that maximize reuse, reduce logistics needs from Earth, encourage in-situ recycling, minimize logistics footprint, and prevent microbial and volatile releases that contaminate the vehicle and planetary surface."

Child gaps

  • 0702-01: Non-metabolic solid waste processes that reduce volume, stabilize, and recover water
  • 0702-02: Resource recovery and repurposing from trash
  • 0702-03: Compact low-logistics commode for exploration

Traceability

  • Use cases and functions: UC-L-201 L -- FN-L-301 L; UC-L-202 L -- FN-L-302 L; UC-H-102 M -- FN-L-301 M; UC-H-103 M -- FN-L-302 M
  • Definition tasks: Mars: MD-10 Mars Forward Contamination Planetary Protection Risk Posture; Waste and Trash Disposal Strategy (In Space); Waste and Trash Disposal Strategy (Mars Surface)
  • Cross-reference: FN-L-301 L, "Manage waste from habitable assets(s) on the lunar surface", is also one of the Users Guide's Phase 1 functional gaps, and its habitation capability targets include "Demonstrate management of waste streams on the lunar surface" (Users Guide, p. 9; see Phase 1 functional gaps). This link joins the two sources; neither makes it.

Segments and sub-architectures

Priority

Priority bin 3, overall prioritization rating 21 of 57. The rating is "the gap's location in the prioritized list of gaps", so 1 is the highest priority, and bins group gaps of similar priority, bin 1 highest. Criticality, urgency, breadth and depth set the order; cost is not considered (ADD Rev C, pp. 78, 199; method on the gaps index).

Moon Base relevance

Not established by the sources so far. The Users Guide does not name #0702 among its near-term Moon Base challenges (Technology and knowledge challenges). The function cross-reference under Traceability is a link between sources, not a mapping either source makes.

Sources

Tech gaps spreadsheet, ESDMD #0702 · Planetary protection white paper, p. 4 · ADD Rev C, pp. 78, 199, 235 · Users Guide, p. 9