Giving Compass' Take:

• Steve Hanley at CleanTechnica reports how plastic waste is being converted into bricks to help build Ivory Coast schools.

• Recycling plastic trash is also creating opportunities for local women in the Ivory Coast. How can we turn recycling into other innovative solutions? 

• Here are avenues for tackling marine plastic waste and pollution. 


Plastic waste is a little like electric cars. 10 years ago, we heard very little about either one. Today, there are news stories about both every day of the week. The world is drowning in discarded plastic. Coca-Cola is the number one source of single use plastic bottles — spewing 200,000 of them into the environment every minute of every day. But it is just one of many companies that have been built by ignoring the damage its products cause. By some estimates, by 2050 the total weight of all the plastic waste in the oceans will be more than the weight of all the fish in the sea. But things are changing, albeit slowly.

In Abidjan, the commercial capitol of the Ivory Coast, almost 300 tons of plastic is discarded every day. Only about 5% of it is recycled. Yet the city and surrounding area have a critical shortage of classrooms. Conceptos Plásticos is a company in Columbia that makes plastic bricks out of plastic trash. In partnership with UNICEF, it has supplied enough bricks to make 9 new classrooms in Abidjan. It is building a new factory to manufacture its plastic bricks in Yopougon, a suburb of Abidjan.

When the factory is at full capacity, it will produce 9,200 tons of plastic bricks a year — enough to build more than 1,800 classrooms. UNICEF has agreed to buy enough bricks from Conceptos Plásticos for over 500 classrooms, according to France24. The bricks have several advantages over traditional bricks or concrete block. They are much lighter, which makes them easy to transport to remote locations. They can even be carried by mules or humans to places that are inaccessible to wheeled vehicles.

They cost about 1/3 less than bricks or cinder blocks, meaning cash-strapped governments and NGOs can build more classrooms and other structures with the money they have available. They use no mortar so they don’t need repointing regularly the way traditional bricks and concrete blocks do. They are a better insulator, so classrooms stay cooler. And they are non-toxic because no PVC is used to make them.

Read the full article about converting plastic waste into bricks by Steve Hanley at CleanTechnica.