This Cooler is Made from Plastic Bottles and Uses No Electricity
There are so many places around the world where heat is a major problem, and some villages in these hot areas can’t afford proper HVAC or high tech cooling systems. So the Grey Dhaka agency and employees from GISBL (Grameen Intel Social Business Ltd.) started a project to create an eco-cooler that used zero energy—and they did!
By using repurposed plastic soda bottles, they have developed a simple yet very effective eco-cooler that doesn’t need electricity.
There isn’t really electronics or tech in the idea—it’s mostly a mix of physics and innovation. The soda bottles are cut in half across the middle and arranged in an array and attached to a board. The side of the board where the smaller openings of the soda bottles are—will be facing the window, while the side where the larger bottle openings are—will be facing the outer side.
The Eco Cooler method is fairly simple, from a construction standpoint. A board is cut to fit the desired window, and bottleneck-sized holes are cut out in a grid pattern. The bottoms of empty plastic bottles are cut off and discarded, leaving funnel-shaped bottlenecks that are placed on the grid. That’s all there is to the Eco Cooler, except for the task of installing it in place of the regular window. When mounted, the wider part of the bottles faces outward and catches the passing wind, literally funneling cool air into the building’s interior.
The science is that as hot air passes through the large openings, the air will be compressed in the small openings and will produce colder air. This helps reduce the temperatures by 5 degrees! The makers of this project encourage everyone to follow this design, with the steps available on their website and make their own version of the eco-cooler.
The efficacy of the Eco Cooler varies widely based on conditions, but Grey Group reports it has the ability to reduce indoor temperatures as much as 5 degrees Celsius, which is on par with what an electric centrally installed air conditioning system can do. In some instances the Eco Cooler can reduce indoor temperatures from a sweltering 86F (30C) to a comfortable 77F (25C). For the 70 percent of residents who live in tin-roofed huts that amplify the sun’s heat, the Eco Cooler could be a breath of fresh air just in time for summer.
