Extraordinary Reuse Projects – 10 Amazing Ways to Recycle Plastic Bottles

 

plastic-bottles_kafreddy

Image by fhemerick

Plastic bottles are produced, consumed, and trashed each and every day.  Of the 28 billion bottles of water bought by Americans each year, more than 22 billion sit in landfills.  Only 13% of our plastic bottles are recycled.  

Those statistics on plastic bottles don’t include the ones that have been rescued for amazing reuse projects!  We’ve discovered more than 340,000 plastic bottles in the creations below – from chic plastic vests to floating islands, the possibilities for reusing bottles are endless …

floating-plastic-bottle-island

Richie Sowa’s Spiral Island floats off the coast of Mexico atop 250,000 plastic bottles.  The plastic island is completely self-sustaining and is classified as a ship with the freedom to float wherever Sowa would like to go.  

plastic-bottle-house

If you prefer your residence to feature a bit more land and a little less water, this house is made of 8,000 plastic bottles and is one of many bottle homes built by Honduras-based Eco-Tec.  The bottles are filled with mud and bound together with a cement mixture, offering low cost, long lasting construction. 

fanta-dog

Is anyone else saying “poor doggie”?  While it may not be considered extraordinary, this plastic doggie armor is definitely a bizarre reuse of a plastic bottle.  

plastic-bottle-vest

This plastic bottle apparel looks a little more comfortable than the doggie sweater above.  Designed by Saleyla, the vest is made of 16 plastic bottles.  The designer decorated each plastic piece with her slogan, but the possibilities are endless – artwork, logos, etc.

plastic-purse

A couple of the leftover bottom pieces from the recycled plastic bottle project above – and a zipper – are all you need  to make a one-of-a-kind coin purse.  The zipper is sewn in using a needle and thread.  


[metacafe]http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1211208/a_solar_powered_toy_car_handmade[/metacafe]

A Japanese engineer creates cars with his plastic bottles.  For now, the solar-powered plastic racer is only available in miniature size – but with advancements in plastic recycling, we may very well see cars made of plastic bottles in the near future.  

 

plastic-bottle-bike

Image by Monte Mitchell

This team of 4 Appalachian University students is already brainstorming the possibilities of a plastic bottle car after winning first place in the Juicy Ideas competition sponsored late last year by Google.  Their winning entry was a plastic bottle bike that worked – at least for a little while until the front end snapped off.

junk-raft

The Junk Raft recently voyaged from California to Hawaii to raise awareness about the amount of plastic polluting our oceans.  Six pontoons, filled with 15,000 plastic bottles, sit below salvaged sailboat masts and the recycled Cessna cabin.  After 3 months afloat, the plastic bottles beneath the raft were still in excellent condition – more than can be said for the shriveled stomach of the fish caught on the trip, sporting “14 fragments of plastic in it’s stomach”.  

plastic-bottle-curtains

These plastic bottle curtains adorned the Jasmil Olympic Stadium in Seoul during the first-time Designbloom Mart in October, 2008.   The ‘beads’ were created from a variety of plastics, including soda bottles, detergent containers, and plastic egg trays.

Pensioner builds house made of plastic bottles

Tomislav Radovanovic, a math professor in Serbia, built this house with 13,500 plastic bottles and a little cement.  The foundation, support pillars, and roof are cement – the rest of the construction is nothing but rescued plastic bottles.

29 thoughts on “Extraordinary Reuse Projects – 10 Amazing Ways to Recycle Plastic Bottles”

  1. Wow. very awesome. I'm startled – really..to the extent of wanting my own way of recycling these plastic bottles. I have the urged but the time constraints hindered me to start. But after reading this post, oh my, my urge again is telling me to start doing my own thing…yes, I like the coin purse though and the “plastic-made-floating island”.

  2. Wow. very awesome. I'm startled – really..to the extent of wanting my own way of recycling these plastic bottles. I have the urged but the time constraints hindered me to start. But after reading this post, oh my, my urge again is telling me to start doing my own thing…yes, I like the coin purse though and the “plastic-made-floating island”.

  3. SWEET ways to recycle! i am doing a report on this stuff. Does anyone have any other info on it?
    – M.P age 11

  4. SWEET ways to recycle! i am doing a report on this stuff. Does anyone have any other info on it?
    – M.P age 11

  5. The Bicycle Expressways project http://www.bikeXways.org proposes to build all-weather bike paths sheltered by transparent canopies. Recycled PET 1 (polyethylene terephthalate) plastic might be a suitable, low-cost material for the canopies. By recycling an abandoned railroad right-of-way a la http://www.railstotrails.org/index.html and covering with a recycled plastic canopy, the feasibility of year-round commuting by bicycles could be greatly increased.

  6. I don't like the bike, it looks like a piece of junk. In our house we have used plastic bottles to make boat's, musical instruments, rockets (what a great day out we had in space) and mobiles! The school has also been building a greenhouse as part of the ECO club. We also like to think we can build ANYTHING out of rubbish in our house and paper mac-he is a favorite.

  7. I don't like the bike, it looks like a piece of junk. In our house we have used plastic bottles to make boat's, musical instruments, rockets (what a great day out we had in space) and mobiles! The school has also been building a greenhouse as part of the ECO club. We also like to think we can build ANYTHING out of rubbish in our house and paper mac-he is a favorite.

  8. WOw this is definitely a good idea. we can recycle at the same time we can create new products out of these junks, this will be a very big help for our environment

  9. Those ideas will keep your bins empty for a while, LOL!!!! the puppy is so cute with that armor

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