Manila, Philippines – Liter of Light, a Filipino-born global grassroots solar lighting movement, has partnered with the University of Santo Tomas (UST) for a large-scale solar art installation to raise awareness and call for urgent action on the ongoing climate crisis.
Building on the success of its award-winning “Light It Forward” campaign, Liter of Light’s lat-est initiative – called “Messages for the Planet” – engages young people in leading the call for change in climate policies, even in the midst of a global pandemic.
By inviting youth climate leaders and environmental luminaries from the university to design and build a large-scale installation using its hand-built solar lights, the organization is using its platform to amplify the voices calling for climate action.
The UST installation features a large sun and the figure 1.5, to represent the critical 1.5 degree C threshold that the world must adhere to in order to avoid major climate change catastrophes, in-cluding super typhoons, which are the direct result of rising ocean temperatures.
“This week, we are confronted once again with the fact that the Philippines is on the front lines of the climate crisis. We can – we must – act now,” said Illac Diaz, Founder and Executive Direc-tor of Liter of Light. “Typhoon Odette destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes and lives across the country in a matter of hours. Through this symbolic installation with UST, we are call-ing for dramatic action to halt global warming that is devastating our environment and endanger-ing our way of life.”
The installations are part of a series of pop-up artworks that Liter of Light is building across Metro Manila to raise awareness and urgency for climate action. It recently completed large-scale solar art installations in St. Andrews, Scotland with youth environmental leaders and student representatives to the global climate change conference, COP26.
After the unveiling of this week’s installation, which includes a mass in tribute to the victims of this latest natural disaster, the lights used to create the artwork will be deployed to the communi-ties ravaged by Typhoon Odette.
About “Human Power: Messages for the Planet”
Building on the success of our award-winning Light It Forward campaign (www.lightitforward.ph), Liter of Light launched its newest initiative: Human-Powered Messag-es for the Planet. Similar to Twitter, the organization calls on youth from across the world to submit messages of hope for the future, which it converts into solar powered billboards at key locations throughout various cities.
Liter of Light uses village parks, helicopter pads, or public spaces all around key cities as a hu-man-made billboard to share these Messages for the Planet that are part of the communities where we all live. Because of existing health and safety protocols, all of the messages are built with ONLY 3-10 adult artists creating the installation using our hand-built solar lights.
The installations can then be viewed online through videos taken by drone, with viewers encour-aged to interact with the installation from the safety of home, sharing on social media how they contributed to the artwork.
With new messages unveiled every month, Liter of Light is making a strong statement to raise awareness for climate action by giving young people an opportunity to contribute to real solutions and have a tangible impact, even at a time when public art has disappeared and people are confined to their homes.
The Philippines’ geography is one of the main factors for being most at risk from the effects of the climate crisis. The Philippines is hit by an average of 20 typhoons every year, with the inten-sity of these storms increasing exponentially in recent years, making it one of the most countries most vulnerable to climate change. Many youth are nervous about the future, with billions of pe-sos in economic losses, and over thousands of lives already lost due to the effects of climate change. With the global pandemic, however, opportunities for youth to express their views on climate change have been severely limited.
After each of these milestone installations, the organization will donate the lights built for these installations to energy-poor villages served by its country chapters in compliance with any epi-demiological, health, and safety protocols in place.
About Liter of Light:
Working in 32 countries with over 2,700 youth ambassadors, Liter of Light is one of the largest organizations that works with youth to engage companies in Europe, Latin America, Southeast Asia, and Africa on building simple and repairable solar lights, mobile charging systems, and street lights. Using materials from within each community, the organization has empowered the lives of over one million people a year, while creating opportunities for green micro business, and lowering carbon emissions by 1000kg per hand-built solar lamp.
