Improving the World with Plastic Bottles

Imagine you’re 4 years old and the teacher tells you to draw a person. You draw something that looks like an anorexic who just had a terrifying accident.  You look over and the kid sitting next to you just created the Mona Lisa.

A few years ago, I made a bird feeder out of an empty 2 liter plastic bottle. I’d bought a simple kit that provided a hanger, a perch, and instructions. I’d felt good about reusing a bit of plastic in a constructive way.  Unfortunately, the project was an epic fail (as my granddaughter would say). The squirrels destroyed the bottle the very first night, leaving me to clean up after them. In the world of plastic bottles, my project was lower than the 4-year-old's drawing would be in the art world.
     
Today I searched the internet for other ways to use empty plastic bottles. I got almost 7 million hits! It turns out that lots of interesting and useful things can be made from plastic bottles. There are lovely images of plastic bottle planters, although I couldn’t tell if they were being used for tomato plants or marijuana from the picture. Interesting, but still child's play.

I was impressed by one site that promised 25 things to do with them, until I saw another site that promised everything to do with plastic bottles. Really? Everything? I don’t think so.

When I found a video showing a school made from “bricks” of plastic bottles filled with tightly packed sand, I thought I’d found the ultimate way to put all these empty bottles to good use. 

But I was wrong. The Leonardo da Vinci of plastic bottles is Alfredo Moser.  His simple yet ingenious use of empty plastic bottles has improved the lives of millions of the world's most needy people, those who live crowded together in unspeakable poverty; people who can afford neither windows nor the electricity to light their makeshift dwellings. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23536914

By filling the bottle with water, adding a few drops of bleach to discourage algae growth, anyone can fill a room with enough sunshine to mimic the light of a 40 or 50 watt bulb.  

I think he deserves a Nobel prize for this invention, don't you?