NASA promises $3 million to anyone who can figure out how to dispose of human waste bags on the Moon

21 April 2025 , 15:45

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NASA promises $3 million to anyone who can figure out how to dispose of human waste bags on the Moon

NASA has initiated the LunaRecycle Challenge. It provides a $3 million prize for converting lunar waste to useful resources.

NASA is offering $3 million to anyone who can invent a way to “recycle” dozens of bags of poop astronauts left on the moon more than half a century ago.

The space agency wants to come up with a way to transform 96 sacks of feces, urine and vomit — ditched by Apollo astronauts to lighten their load — into water, energy, and fertilizer, it said.

The so-called “LunaRecycle Challenge” urges scientists and innovators to solve the crappy problem and kickstart a “biological legacy” in time for its upcoming moon mission.

NASA said it ultimately wants to “reduce toxic outputs” — from a galaxy fart, fart away.

“NASA is committed to sustainable space exploration. As we prepare for future human space missions, we will need to consider how to minimize various waste streams, including solid waste, as well as how to store, process, and recycle them in a space environment so that they are returned to Earth as little as possible,” the agency said.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Apollo astronauts had to leave behind items they no longer needed — such as used suits, technical equipment and their own space dumps — to make room for lunar samples they collected.

But now, as NASA prepares to send people back to the moon for its Artemis program, the agency hopes to find a useful way to get rid of the waste.

Astronauts ditched 96 bags of human waste on the moon in 1969.Getty Images

The competition’s deadline  was March 31 and NASA is now getting ready to pore through the pitches.

James Turner