Algeria
Sand Origin
Algerian Sahara, 5 km north of Timimoun
Random Sand Fact
What can you do with 6,000 plastic bottles and a lot of sand? Build a house.
In Sahrawi refugee camps in Algeria, discarded plastic bottles are packed with sand and stacked as building blocks.
The idea was developed by engineer Tateh Lehbib Breica. He built the first house for his grandmother. Its round form and sand-filled bottles made it better able to withstand strong winds and heavy rain than many traditional mud-brick homes.
UNHCR picked up the idea and funded another 25 houses.
