Wastewater Treatment and Remediation

Kennedy Space Center, Merritt Island, FL

Media before treating an ammonia waste stream (left), and media after treating an ammonia waste stream (right). (Image: NASA)

NASA Kennedy Space Center has developed a water remediation treatment system that utilizes an affordable media that is highly selective for ammonia, allowing large concentrations of ammonia in wastewater to be reduced to levels less than 1 ppm. Following treatment, the media is regenerated for reuse in the system and ammonia is captured as a by-product.

Removing nitrogen pollutants, like ammonia, is a critical environmental issue. Nitrogen pollution is causing serious changes to aquatic ecosystems; the primary cause of which is insufficient municipal water filtration processes allowing nitrogen to seep into groundwater. NASA’s Ammonia Recovery System could be utilized in a multitude of ways to remove nitrogen from various wastewater sources.

The system was developed for smaller-scale, space-based applications. However, the technology is scalable for larger industrial and municipal water treatment applications. Implementation of the Ammonia Recovery System could significantly reduce nitrogen content from water treatment processes, meaningfully improving the quality of water.

This system offers a novel way to reduce nitrogen water pollutants, while allowing for the nitrogen to be collected and reused — reducing environmental and public health risks and providing an environmentally friendly fertilizer option. NASA’s environmental solutions work to sustain life on Earth through space-based technology. The adaptable nature of this system gives it potentially broad applications in a wide variety of industries; it is particularly ideal for on-site remediation of wastewater in places like condo complexes, hotels, and water parks.

Current methods of ammonia recovery could not meet NASA’s mission requirements, so a new process was devised to optimize for high ammonia selectivity, simplicity, low volume, low power usage, and zero contaminants in the effluent. To do this, NASA designed a novel regenerable struvite-formation system for the capture of ammonia.

This system has three primary functions: removal of ammonia from wastewater using a media that is highly selective for ammonia; capture of the ammonia for later use (e.g., as a fertilizer); and regeneration of the capture media for reuse in the system.

This technology could be incorporated into water treatment systems at various stages including water treatment, effluent polishing, resource reclamation, resource recycling, gray water treatment, etc.

NASA is actively seeking licensees to commercialize this technology. Please contact NASA’s Licensing Concierge at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call at 202-358-7432 to initiate licensing discussions. For more information, visit here .