recycled plastic block houses dot com
We are recycling 100% of plastic trash into standard sized building blocks using no heat or chemicals, no fuel, and no electricity.
I have completed a working machine. I'm successfully making blocks. I will be soon building a structure with it.
Ronald Omyonga is a Kenyan architect. He challenged me to come up with a product and system that would generate commerce while creating housing in the slums of Nairobi. That was early November. December 15 I made the first block.
We have generated enthusiasm in Africa, Thailand, and here in the States.
You can see the creative process at harveylacey.com and RecycledPlasticBlockHouses.com
This project accomplishes multiple worthy goals. Recycels unwanted plastic trash, creates commerce, and provides permanent housing.
About You
About You
First Name
harvey
Last Name
lacey
About Your Organization
Organization Name
Organization Website
Organization Phone
Organization Address
Organization Country
United States, TX
Country where this project is creating social impact
Kenya
Is your organization a
Not registered
How long has your organization been operating?
Less than a year
The information you provide here will be used to fill in any parts of your profile that have been left blank, such as interests, organization information, and website. No contact information will be made public. Please uncheck here if you do not want this to happen..
Innovation
Entry Form title
recycled plastic block houses dot com
Describe your project
We are recycling 100% of plastic trash into standard sized building blocks using no heat or chemicals, no fuel, and no electricity.
I have completed a working machine. I'm successfully making blocks. I will be soon building a structure with it.
Ronald Omyonga is a Kenyan architect. He challenged me to come up with a product and system that would generate commerce while creating housing in the slums of Nairobi. That was early November. December 15 I made the first block.
We have generated enthusiasm in Africa, Thailand, and here in the States.
You can see the creative process at harveylacey.com and RecycledPlasticBlockHouses.com
This project accomplishes multiple worthy goals. Recycels unwanted plastic trash, creates commerce, and provides permanent housing.
What stage is your project in?
Operating for less than a year
What makes your project unique as it relates to the theme of this competition?
It brings those who want to clean up plastic pollution and those who want to provide housing for the poor together with the interests of those who want to eliminate poverty.
The structure is earthquake resistant, it flexes instead of breaks. The design incorporates traditional building methods except the blocks are plastic instead of stone or wood or bundles of straw. It is tied together with wire instead of vines, leather, or string.
It provides a method for the locals to build the house they want, not the house that was built for them in an industrialized nation, not the house some charity believes they deserve, but a house that they want built the way they want to build it.
Commerce is created when locals procure plastic trash and are paid for their efforts. Others use the machine to make building blocks and they are paid when the blocks are sold for building shelters. The shelters create value and income for those who own them.
Another scenario would have the plastic brought in sorted so the valuable recyclable plastic can be sold. The beauty of the block is it can be made from the bad plastics even easier than it can with the good stuff that has recyclable value.
The blocks can be made by automated machines in the industrialized world from plastic trash too difficult for normal recycling. These blocks could be shipped to disasters for housing.
This concept works anywhere. Wet or dry climate, whereever.
Share the story of the founder and what inspired the founder to start this project
I'm an inventor. I have three U.S. patents. You can see a video of me and the block and machine here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zrr0EMFk7es
This came about because of Ronald Omyonga. He's an architect in Kenya that is wanting to create sustainable housing in Nairobi slums while creating commerce.
He laid out the challenge at a meeting in Dallas. Six weeks later we are making blocks
Dr. Owen Geiger of sustainable housing fame is on board. He has an article prepared for publishing in Mother Earth News on the block and machine
Social Impact
This Entry is about (Issues)
Who or what (i.e. youth, women, environment, etc.) benefits from your project, and why is your project critical?
I have worked hard to make the machine capable of being operated by women and large children safely. It uses no fuel, no electricity, and can be made locally from a material list, drawings, and photos on the website.
Use Haiti as an example. They have a large plastic trash problem. A twelve by twelve foot shelter made with the blocks will remove approximately one shipping container's worth of plastic trash from the landfill and landscape.
Haitians can make the home they want, not the one other's want for them. The blocks weeigh about seven pounds. Compare this to forty or so pounds for a comparable concete or stone block.
Please describe how your project has been successful and how that success is measured.
We haven't built a shelter yet. We don't have many blocks made. But consider this, less than three weeks after the first block was made we have generated interest on three continents.
It's too simple. Plastic trash is stuffed into a cavity in a machine. A lever operates a screw and the plastic is compacted into a block. That block is secured by wire.
The wire securing the block is used to secure the block to other blocks and to provide strength to a wall.
The downside of the block is the fire hazard. But everywhere we've thought about using the block there is a tradition of using plaster. The compbination of the plaster and plastic provides good thermal insulation.
How many people have been impacted by your project?
Fewer than 100
How many people could be impacted by your project in the next three years?
More than 10,000
What barriers might hinder the success of your project and how do you plan to overcome them?
International business interests could be a problem. Those who are selling expensive and ineffective measures to the thir world now will not appreciate the introduction of inexpensive self help methods and machines.
Everywhere there is a degree of corruption tax. That tax rate is highest where poverty is greatest. One of the beauties of the concept is the base material is trash, no value. The machine has no value for other purposing.
The most resistance I've experienced so far is from academia. I have some ideas for this but they're not worth repeating.
How will your project evolve over the next three years?
This is open source. I went open source rather than intellectual property protection for a couple of reasons.
The most important reason involves the importance of the concept. It's too important for me to put through the time consuming process of patent protection etc.
The second reason is I appreciate more than most the genius of others. Three years from now recycled plastic building blocks might not resemble my concept at all.
I'm okay with that.
Sustainability
For each selection, please explain the financial and non-financial support from each
I'm out of work. I own equipment and I have time.
I believe the concept and working model will be accepted by others. It is that special.
I'm not good at business. I don't want to be. I'm an inventor.
Those who are good at business will take this where I never could. They have my blessing.
How do you plan to grow and/or diversify your base of support in the next three years?
The internet.
It's that simple. The machine can be manufactured here in the States for less than three hundred dollars worth of materia cost. The material list, drawings with dimensions, and detailed photos are online for anyone to copy and manufacture.
NGO's can have the machines made in India or China for less than three hundred dollars including shipping to Haiti, Africa, South America, anywhere.
Each machine can make hundreds to thousands of houses. Each house can remove a shipping container's volume of trash plastic from the landscape and landfills.
The potential is unfathonable at this point in time.
I have dreams for this. I would like to see engineering students partner with highschool metal working classes to create adn improve the machines. I would love for both groups to experience being part of something bigger than themselves.
The same thing goes for charity NGO's. They could do so much more with their funds. The building materials are there and free. The machines are manual and they can be left when the group leaves to be used again and again.
Well, its the internet and inate human goodness, a lethal combination against poverty.
Collaboration
Please select your areas of intervention in the home improvement market
Design, Infrastructure, Green housing, Environment, Income generation, Urban development, Rural development, Citizen/community participation.
Is your innovation addressing barriers in the home improvement/progressive housing market? If so, please describe in detail your mechanisms of intervention
The third world suffers from a lack of materials to build housing. Our program remedies that by converting existing plastic trash into a viable construction material, building blocks. This is a one hundred percent conversion rate, one pound of plastic trash becomes one pound of construction material.
The blocks inside a plastered wall is estimated to have a life in excess of five hundred years.
Are you currently collaborating with private companies, or have you partnered with private companies in the past? With which companies?
This is open source. We have the plans and material list along with photos online so that anyone anywhere can build a machine and start processing plastic trash into blocks for building shelters.
Please describe in detail the nature of the partnership(s)
Select the unit(s) with which the partnership was formed
 | 117 weeks ago Nils Sautter said: i hope i can help your project by promoting it on a plattform for "eco-social real estate" projects: http://bit.ly/fyXvqp feel free ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 122 weeks ago harvey lacey said: Thank you for commenting Jamie. Right now I'm waiting for the engineers to catch up with me. Things are happening on that as we ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 122 weeks ago Jamie Bechtel said: Hi Harvey - I'll tell you - you've got my attention! Simple solutions are key to success in the field and that is exactly what you have ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 122 weeks ago harvey lacey updated this Competition Entry. |
| 123 weeks ago harvey lacey updated this Competition Entry. |
| 124 weeks ago harvey lacey updated this Competition Entry. |
| 124 weeks ago harvey lacey submitted this idea. |
