• by IPS Correspondents
• Friday, July 06, 2012
• Inter Press Service

Jul 06 (IPS) - UNITED NATIONS, July 6 — A new initiative in the Philippines has inspired communities to brighten up their neighbourhoods turning empty bottles into solar powered light bulbs.

“We used to take this bottle for granted… now we can’t live without it”, says one resident of Sitio Malagaya beneath the luminous glow of the light-emitting bottle sealed into the ceiling of her home.

In the small, tightly packed neighbourhood of Sitio Malagaya, where access to electricity is scarce, the sun serves as the principal source of light, leaving houses habitually shrouded in darkness.

But a simple and innovative solution has had a profound impact on the lives of residents, enabling them to convert accident-prone dwellings filled with the traps of perpetual darkness into sun-lit homes.

“You punch a hole in a piece of metal roofing, you slip in a bottle apply some sealant, then fill it with filtered water, add some bleach and install it on the roof its that simple” explains the local solar-powered light bulb fitter, nicknamed ‘Solar Demi’.

The sunlight filters through the bottle, which emits as much light as a 55-watt electric light bulb, but at the reduced cost of two to five dollars and with the eco-friendly benefits of a waste plastic bottle powered by renewable solar energy.

The idea forms a part of one of the projects run by the MyShelter Foundation, created by Philippine student Illac Diaz with the aim of developing social enterprise and low-cost technologies in the Philippines.

The solar-powered light bulb is inspired by the initiatives of communities who have long used glass bottles to light up their homes, and was developed by students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) working to provide simple and replicable technologies to developing communities.

According to statistics from the National Electrification Commission in 2009, three million households still remain powerless outside Metro Manila, the urban economic and political hub of the Philippines.

Whilst darkness reduces the utility of the home, the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) has reported that a large number of fire-related incidents in the country involve faulty electrical connections.

The ambitious sustainable light project, titled One Litre of Light has reached communities in Philippines and sister projects are also underway in Mexico and Brazil facilitating long-term access to light in rural communities through use of the sun’s renewable energy resources.

© Inter Press Service (2012) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service

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