An Ecobrick is a brick made from unrecyclable plastic, stuffed into a drinks bottle. It becomes an extremely hard ‘brick’ that can then be used for building. But, is it a method of building the future?
Last Friday, I briefly mentioned, the concept of Ecobricks and how you could start to create your own. Today, I want to give you a bit more information to help you create a perfect brick that can be sent off to be used in a structure.
The concept of Ecobricking started in countries such as the Philippines, Thailand and South Africa. Individuals started to come together to make the bricks out of the waste plastic that was overwhelming their communities. These bottles filled with plastic are used to make buildings, for example schools, homes and toilet blocks. In countries where the weather will eventually degrade the plastic, the bottles are encased in a concrete-like material. In other climates, the visible plastic is used to make a colourful feature.
In the UK, the concept is very new and people have mixed views. There is currently an Ecobricks UK Facebook group which, if you are interested, you can send a join request to. The group tries to help with questions, gives updates on the nationwide collection points and talks about the projects that are using the bricks.
So how do you make this brick? I am going to give you some step by step instructions or you can visit the Ecobricks website for a how to guide.
First, find a bottle that you will use to make your Ecobrick (of a size mentioned below). You can use different sizes, the only difference will be how much the brick must weigh at the end. TOP TIPS: I recommend a bottle with smooth sides and if possible a smooth bottom. This makes compacting the plastic easier. Perhaps start with a 500ml bottle to get the hang of it, before moving onto a 2 litre one.
Any clean, dry, soft plastic can go in. This could be the wrappers from cereal bars, crisps and chocolate bars; food packaging from peppers, leeks or apples; cling film (making sure it is clean and dry is the hard part with cling film); lids from yogurt pots; or packaging you receive in delivered parcels. It is brilliant for containing the micro plastics you might have, for example, the tiny plastic tag that holds the label on new clothes.
All your plastic needs to be washed to remove food residue and then dried. If there is organic matter inside the brick or it is wet, it will eventually grow or start to let off a gas. This will compromise the strength of the brick and in turn the strength of the structure it is being used in. It can also not be material that will degrade or might have too many organisms on it – so no paper, tissue, balloons, slime etc. Foil backed items like crisp packets or medicine pill strips are fine.
TOP TIP: if you think that washing all the plastic is going to be too time consuming for you, start a brick that only uses clean plastic. This could be: the tiny tag from your clothes; the plastic seal from a glass jar; the corner you cut off from a cereal bag; the wrapper from a magazine; the air filled pillows that hold a delivery in place (burst them first!). If you are diligent enough to cut all the air pockets out of bubble wrap that could go in too – personally I put that in the carrier bag recycler at the supermarket.
Once your plastic is dry, cut it into small pieces. This is not an exact activity and very easy for children to be involved in. You want the pieces to be around the size of a credit card or slightly bigger. If they are too small, they become too static and won’t easily get into the bottle. Too large and it makes them harder to compact.
The next step is to start stuffing it into the bottle. You will need to find a stick that is taller than the length of the bottle. For a 500 ml bottle, a wooden spoon is perfect. I used a piece of dowel from the shed for my 2 litre bottle. Put in plenty of pieces of plastic, then ram them down into the bottom. They will bounce back up to start with but eventually you will see the layer forming. There can be no air pockets so if your bottle has cone like sections as a base you need to get them full and hard. You should not be able to press the bottle and feel it move.
The finished bottle’s weight must be as described on the chart above. TOP TIP: Weigh the bottle when it is a quarter full, half full etc. This will give you a good indication as to whether or not you are pushing the plastic down hard enough.
It may take several weeks or even months to fill your first bottle. Sadly, it might even be that your first attempt has to go in the bin as it is not dense enough to build with – mine did! I didn’t weigh it during the process and the top half was much harder than the bottom. Unfortunately, as the top half was packed in, I couldn’t force it down any more.
What this process will give you, is a very stark insight into is how much plastic your household is responsible for. You will get a good indication of the plastic packaged items that you use weekly and that is a brilliant way of think of and find alternatives.
Once your brick is finished and it weighs the correct amount, someone should be able to stand on it and nothing should happen! You must then register your brick on the EcoBrick site. This gives your brick a reference number and helps the founders monitor eco bricking across the world.
If you get this far, then you will have to join the Ecobricks UK Facebook page to find out where to take your brick. They have an ever growing list of people who are collection points around the UK. Once you join, it is in the ‘files’ tab at the top as a PDF called Collection Points. This is the cheapest way to pass on your brick(s). Otherwise, you will need to pay to post them off to a given address.
My views about the Ecobricking concept are mixed, despite being on my third brick. It is very, very time consuming to wash and dry all your waste plastic ready to go into the bottle. To then cut it up and stuff it into the bottle takes even more time. Is it a building brick for the future? I would say it can't be and shouldn't be. It is not, and has never been sold as, a long term solution. Long term we need to cut off the production of this type of plastic at the source. Giving people the 'get out' of saying 'Oh, it's ok, I can put it in my ecobrick' isn't creating a long term solution. The plastic still remains, regardless of the fact it now serves a useful function.
However, as a short term solution, it does work and there are not a lot of alternatives out there at present for this type of plastic packaging. Our normal landfill bin each week is now very, very small thanks to purchasing less, recycling more and Ecobricking. That was my goal at the beginning of the year and for that reason I keep stuffing the brick!