Life on the International Space Station is a lesson in efficiency. A good example of this is the initiative of NASA – astronauts to process urine into drinking water. The company, which is designed to treat wastewater, unusable drinking water, will cooperate with NASA – reports CNN. The technology created by the company will help humanity overcome challenges and increase access to clean water around the world.

Although astronauts in space need a water supply system, this does not mean that astronauts have to rely solely on the way urine is excreted to get clean water. Moreover, Aquaporin, the company behind this system, suggests that the same type of technology could be used to treat other types of wastewater or to filter existing drinking water supplies to the point where they can be used.

The technique works just like your kidneys. It filters the contaminated liquid, the water in the equipment flows into a compartment called aquaporins. They are the ones who provide water filtration.

“It has huge potential,” Dines Thornberg, Innovation Manager at BIOFOS, Denmark’s largest state-owned organization, told CNN. “I think the Aquaporin system may help to get clean, affordable drinking water from wastewater in the future. “I am really optimistic that with such technologies we can overcome water shortages and deal with this problem in many parts of the world.”

About 2 billion people do not have access to clean drinking water, according to CNN, and technology such as Aquaporin can help provide clean water to people around the world.