This is how a house built with recycled plastic bricks made in Peru would look

With the aim of making affordable and environmentally-friendly housing, three students from the Civil Engineering Faculty at the Pedro Ruiz Gallo National University of Lambayeque presented prototypes of recycled plastic bricks.

Through this venture, called Ecohogar ('Ecohome'), university students Ausberto Delgado Vásquez, Lot Rios Farro and Jesús Cosio Carmona seek to build highly resistant, single-story houses to help vulnerable areas that suffer problems of saltpeter and events arising from the El Niño phenomenon, such as flooding.

"We want to take all that material that harms the environment, all that big mass, and we want to convert it into bricks to help preserve the environment and promote a highly durable and low-cost material to build homes for low-income families," said Ausberto Delgado, the group's leader.

Investment and costs

Delgado Vásquez added that the construction of a house measuring 323 square feet requires around three metric tons of plastic bottles. In order to produce a brick that is 7.9 inches long and 4.7 inches high, approximately 500 plastic bottles – which could be mixed with their lids – are needed.

"We have a place to deposit all the material and later acquire the machinery we need for mass production, and be able to design and compete in a public tendering process for the governmental programs. As the bricks have a Lego-type format, they can be transported; that is, the columns can be disassembled and taken to another location," added the student, who indicated that they have five brick prototypes and the cost of each module varies between S/10,000 and S/12,000.

More innovative initiatives

Martha Malpica is 64 years old and has a dream: to rebuild Peru using recycled plastic bricks. For this purpose, she spoke with various Peruvian organizations that contributed their ideas to the creation of LadriPlast, bricks made from 50% crushed plastic (3.3 lbs), 45% cement and 5% cellulose and water.

"We could gradually eliminate plastic from our streets and garbage dumps, create jobs, solve the housing problem for people in the poverty belt and encourage self-construction," says Malpica.

Four Arequipa schoolchildren won the Peruvian entrepreneurship challenge, "Reto emprende 2019", and were awarded with an academic internship in Spain. Claret Abarca Enriquez, Alex Rivera Quispe, Sergio Vilca Guevara and Fernando Benavente Córdova presented the "Ladrix" ecological project, featuring 'Ladrix' bricks made from recycled material and cement that serve as effective protection against the cold.

The students attended the "Desafío Emprende" entrepreneurship campus in Barcelona from May 6 to 13, 2019, where they participated in workshops, conferences, visits and other activities related to entrepreneurship, whilst exhibiting and promoting their work.

Sources: Andina/ cocacoladelperu.com