Saving the world on 5p a year.

[davywavy]

As a dynamic entrepreneur, one thing that my company does is supply of a lot of information on things like energy efficiency and carbon reduction to industrial users. In many ways this is great - not only does it allow me to adopt the pious, holier-than-thou aspect of the committed green, but I can claim to be actually doing something more than spouting platitudes and driving or flying long distances to go on protests like many advocates of the green movement I've met.
As I'm always looking for more ways to add a touch of sparkle to my eco-halo, I was considering buying one of the salor rechargers for my phone. Presumably you know the sort of thing, and about £13 isn't much money. Just to make sure I was getting good value for money, I then went and looked at how much electricity it takes to fully charge the average mobile phone battery - and was surprised that it takes approximately 1/400th of a standard unit of electricity. Assuming that a single unit (1kW/h) costs about 10p (and that's a high assumption - it's more like 4-5p, but I'm working on high assumptions just to be sure) it costs about 0.025p to charge my phone. Further assuming that I charge my phone twice a week and this includes a 100% inefficiency, this works out at about 5p a year to charge my phone.
To put it another way, it'd take the solar charger at least 260 years to pay for itself, and that's not taking into account the carbon/energy costs of manufacture and shipping the device itself.

Sometimes being green just isn't worth it.

Comments

[medusa-nw.livejournal.com]

Kind of handy if you're somewhere with no access to electricity though. And it looks cool. :-)

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

I can't actually remember the last time I spent more than 3-4 days (about a chargeful) away from anywhere with available electricity - when was the last time you did?

[(Anonymous)]

Ever notice how warm your phone and charger get whilst charging? That's becuase the process is probably about 5% efficent. You probably blow your way through £2-3 a year charging it, most of which is lost as heat. In your somewhat frosty fortress of solitude, that's probably quite welcome. I expect you huddle round the charger of an evening pleading with H to let you light a candle, or something.

Even so, the solar gizmo is just an overpriced gimmick soley designed to give wooly minded greenies with no technical education an unearned feeling of righteousness, whilst consuming far more resources in it's creation than it will ever save before it is trucked off to clog up a landfill.

These things are just soma for the ill educated.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

That's why I was assuming a couple of hundred percent inefficiency; didn't think it would be as high as that, but I knew it'd be pretty useless.

[(Anonymous)]

Probably best to check the current draw on the device. (Printed on the back) - I think you'll be astonished how inefficient it is.

[(Anonymous)]

Mine says 0.1A, which means two overnight charges a week, about 200 hours at .025kw, costs about 50p. You were closer than me.

[(Anonymous)]

dammit, I can't count, that should be 1000 hours a year, at 0.025kwh/h = 25kwh (no surprise there) costing about 8p a kwh, about £2.10

[medusa-nw.livejournal.com]

Never. :-)

It would be handy abroad as well as you don't need a converter. Not that I'm buying one, mind...

[akcipitrokulo.livejournal.com]

I think the main issue with chargers is that mostly they don't get put on just enough to charge a phone fully, and that really gobbles up power - switching it off when it's done would probably do just as much good as the solar powered one.

[queenortart.livejournal.com]

And you have to buy 5 batteries to go with it? For what I wonder, shouldn't it be doing the charging not the batteries.

[(Anonymous)]

Nickel Hydride batteries, with a life of, ooh, maybe a year for the cheap crap they'll supply.

[elbly.livejournal.com]

I worked in the PV industry for a while. (For any of your readers who are unfamiliar with the term PV it stands for photovoltaic - meaning solar power)

The average PV system will last for about 20 years before the semiconductors that make it break down and need replacing. The average PV system will take about 20-25 years to produce the ammount of energy that was required to create it in the first place, and will take about 50 years to generate enough power to pay for itself at current energy prices.

In other words - I left the industry because it sucks. The only way to improve on the systems is to introduce lenses and mirrors, but the public don't like the look of these systems as they're bulky and unattractive.

The best thing would be for mobile phones to have pv panels just like calulators do.

[(Anonymous)]

Dunno if they're still available, but one used to be able to get batteries with built-in PV panels for Nokia handsets. Need to charge the phone? Put it face down on your desk/dashboard/garden table.

[(Anonymous)]

didn't believe you, did the maths, based on 12p electricity (from somewhere on the web) and fully charging every day, we'd spend 16p/year!! (100mAh, 3.7V phone battery).

so no thanks to the solar charger, and yes cost of manufacture of the gimik must be enormous compared to the saving.

Oli's just been given a wind up phone charger. Fortunately it is also an LED torch, which is useful, and would make a good emergency phone charger whilst still being useful in itself in the wilderness. So it gets useful points even if it gets negative green points...

[(Anonymous)]

You're pricing the energy stored in the battery, not what comes out of the wall. Take a look at your charger current draw, (an amp clamp is handy here, otherwise you just have to trust the rating, which will be marked somewhere on the three pin pluggy end) and wonder at the incredible inefficiency of the thing.