One Liter of Light

I was browsing my friends wall in Facebook when I saw this amazing video. Maybe, I was amazed because I never heard of this before or maybe I was just outdated of what were the updates in the past 3 years of my life. 

The video features an alternative technology developed by Illac Diaz, a young Filipino entrepreneur who founded the MyShelter Foundations. Nurtured by an Italian-born mother, Silvana nee Ancellotti who runs an art house Galeria Duenila, Illac studied High School in Ateneo de Manila in 1990. He earned his bachelor in Management Economics also at Ateneo.

As a young fellow and bachelor, he was then a model, a party-goer and an actor for sometime. He was also an advertising executive for Smart Communication. But he strove for more.

To further his studies, he took a Masters Degree in Entrepreneurship at the Asian Institute of Management (AIM) with graduate thesis: “Shanties to Jobs: Creating a Migrant Center in Manila.” Then he later left to study in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston with Urban Planning, Course II – Urban Studies and Planning. In 2008, he took Masters of Political Administration, MPA 1 in Harvard.

His project called "Isang Litrong liwanag" is Designed and developed by students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the recipe is simple: water-filled soda bottles are installed through a cutout in a roof, with chlorine added to the water to prevent clouding, and the bottle is sealed to the roof to prevent leaking.

Once it’s all done the refracted light is powerful enough to brighten up a home. Light reflected from 1 bottle is equivalent to 55 to 60 watts of electric bulb, for almost ten months of the year.

This project helps some of the poorest Philippines residents save money and live better, in a renewable way. Hopefully this idea will reach the disprivileged communities worldwide.

This is the kind of people our government should be investing; the kind of people that we should replicate in school. People who thinks and engaged into research and not those who are just contented of being an employee and follower of a certain company; people who looks forward equipped with confidence instead of people who are backwards talking and thinking only of negative issues in our society.

Someday, I would be featuring one of our students in CTU. A student who will make a difference. It is a dream, yet it is not impossible. I am looking forward of that day!