Thomas Pesquet: Grey water recycling in Antarctica

Thomas Pesquet talks about the MELiSSA project straight from the ISS

Video by French astronaut Thomas Pesquet filmed inside the ISS. He explains how grey water is recycled at the Franco-Italian Concordia research station in Antarctica. Watch the video.

Pesquet’s own words:

• “I will show you how water recycling technologies designed for deep space exploration missions by MELiSSA ultimately contribute to the clean water dedicated to the ISS (International Space Station), and sanitation in general.
• After giving you some examples of how space technology can be used on Earth, I will show you my favourite spot on the ISS.
• One of these MELiSSA technologies, called Full FIRMUS grey water recycling, allows us to recycle water from sinks, showers, laundry, dirty dishes, and so on.
• This system has been tested since 2005 in a remote, hostile environment, which is quite similar to space: Antarctica.

2800 litres of recycled water produced per day

• At the Franco-Italian Concordia research station, this system produces up to 2800 liters of recycled water per day.
• The same space technology is used for a famous tennis tournament, Roland Garros. At the Jean Bouin Stadium in Paris, shower water is used to supply water to the toilets in the locker rooms.
• In 2020, they saved more than 23 m3 of water in total that would otherwise have been used to flush toilets. This system will be used again in 2021 and 2022.”

Watch the video.