2011-08-04 10:37:10 // Deirdre Robert
// The Idealog Blog
| 2 comments
Skylights are a great way to provide natural internal lighting, but installing them is expensive and if you live in the slums of Manila, you’d think it impossible. Not so. A group of innovative MIT students has found a solution by way of some old soft drink bottles. They've taken the bottles (all 10,000 of them so far), filled them up with some bleached water and popped them into the metal roofs, providing light for the ordinarily dark slums, many of which don’t even have electricity. The bottles work by reflecting sunlight and spreading 360 degrees of 55-watt light into the room below. And with algae inhibited by the bleach, the lights can last for up to five years, pretty impressive we think.
