About plastic eco-bricks

My nephew was taught to conserve the environment through plastic by his school teacher.

Howsoever strange it may sound, I thought of giving it a shot. That you can help Mother Nature by putting used plastic to some more use. The idea didn't attract me initially, but I have this habit of reading everything printed on wrappers - from catchy slogans, ingredients to manufacturing addresses.

On one such e-commerce company's wrapper was written a statement about buyback price of that wrapper being Rs. 15 per kg, if returned in a clean and dry state. (By virtue of experience in this field, I now know that it is mostly on 4 LDPE plastics.) The monetary reward led to the idea catching my fancy. I believe creative ways of making money give me a kick. 

I was pumped by my sibling who enlightened me with the concept of eco-bricks. I was as naive as you at that time. So, I heard patiently. "You take an empty plastic bottle, stuff it with unrecyclable plastic wrappers. Keep on filling it till it is full, push the plastic down with the help of a stick. And your plastic brick is ready."

I was looking out for an easy alternative for reducing screen time. Hence, I took eco-bricking as an opportunity to keep the phone at bay, even for a few minutes. 

While collecting the plastics, I noticed some of them had the same statement of the buyback price. So, I segregated them into two categories. Ones that would go into a plastic bottle and others that would be sold out simply. 

However, my first choice of a bottle was erroneous. It was an oddly shaped bottle that would not have served its purpose. 

Lesson learnt 1: Always stuff plastic into a regular shaped bottle. Unique shapes can wait for some other purpose. 

So, on realising it after a gap of a few days, I and my nephew took out the contents of the quarter stuffed bottle. All things apart, it showed us our food consumption patterns. Maggi wrappers, chips packets, chocolates and biscuit wrappers etc were looked at guiltily.

Food wrappers were washed and dried off to prevent the growth of bacteria through rotting and emission of foul smell. After filling in the bottle tightly, I realised it still had some place in between the plastic wrappers from where it could still be slightly pressed. Approximately, a bottle with the capacity of 1 litre should weigh about 300-400 grams when fully filled with plastic material. It's a guide to the completion stage of your brick.

So, the next bottle was started up only after watching some tutorials on it. 

Lesson learnt 2: Cut plastic into small pieces to make them fit tightly in the bottle, leaving minimal space for air. 

Hence, my nephew assumed a more prominent role. He found a purpose for his hobby - Cutting. We are partners in this business now. He cuts it into pieces and I stuff it into the bottle with all my might. 

Caution is also required in applying strength to push down the plastic. The first accident happened when I was using a wooden stick which couldn't bear the force that was applied to it, so it broke down. Unfortunately, within the bottle. I had to make way for the wood to come out by again taking out the small cut pieces of plastic.

Hence, I replaced the stick with an iron one. (Read 'Screw driver') The other day I was seamlessly applying force to fill in the bottle tightly. Boom! The firmness of the iron punctured the plastic bottle. That too when it was almost full. Effort went in vain. I was heartbroken.

Lesson learnt 3: Neither use a thin wooden stick nor a sharp-edged stick. 

Now, I keep two sticks - one to apply pressure and the other to smoothly push down from the circumference of the bottle. No further hurdles faced since. 

The practice of collecting plastic is not famous in this part of the world. Even my other sibling had questioning expressions on seeing it for the first time. "What purpose would it serve?" is the first question that everyone pops up. 

In fact, my mom dissuades me from doing it. "Garbage collection people already segregate waste," she argues. I believe it is because of this argument only THIS song starts playing out in my mind whenever I grab a plastic bag for eco-bricking.

Unfortunately, even I'm not quite sure but I think some awakened minds are consciously heading towards eco-friendly solutions. As far as I know, one can build structures meant for carrying lightweights. Example: benches for sitting purposes, stools, boundaries for roofless walls. For better options, you can refer to the following link:

https://www.ecobricks.org/build/

Some mentionable structures erected with the use of plastic ecobricks. Below is a stray dog house built by a mumbai based NGO Urvari.

Proceeding, I was installing some software updates on Dad's phone coincidentally, when a message about a campaign on environment day flashed. It encouraged people to deposit waste plastic at a rate much higher than usual. (To be specific, they offered free fuel in these times of rising prices of petrol and diesel.) Like it was meant to be seen by me for keeping my spirits high. 

I was elated on reading it as initially I wondered if I'd be able to find any takers for my plastic offsprings, leave alone selling them off. And all of a sudden it bore fruit. Hence, I successfully indulged in child trading. (Bad humour, I know).

So, I reached the site to drop the eco-bricks. It gave me a sense of achievement. However, a worker at the petrol pump was perplexed. He couldn't help but ask, "Why have you filled the plastic bottle with torn papers?" 

"It is not paper, but plastic within the plastic."

I glanced at their record sheet. It was the 3rd out of the six days of the campaign and only 3 people before me had dropped plastic at the centre, with plastic weighing 65 gms, 125 gms and 44 gms each. 

I walked off the site by dropping 1.46 kgs of plastic. (Should it imply that our family uses more plastic than anyone else's? Kidding).

On a lighter note, my nephew once thought of bringing home the littered pieces of plastic from the playground, so that I could stuff them in the bottle. He was refrained from picking it up for obvious reasons.