Posted 06.20.2011 at 2:30 pm
9 Comments
Charging Phone With A Pot Of Boiling Water
TES New Energy
This Japanese cooking pot converts the heat from a boiling pot of water to electricity that can charge your smartphone at the same time it cooks a delicious meal. The invention, inspired by footage of Japan’s earthquake victims building fires to keep warm, could prove a boon after a natural disaster, when all you’d have to do to keep communication open would be to light a campfire.
The Hatsuden-Nabe thermo-electric cookpot contains strips of thermoelectric ceramics that use the difference in temperature between the bottom of the pot and the water boiling inside it to generate electricity. Using this method, the device takes between three and five hours to charge an iPhone--not much longer than using a crazy space-age AC charger.
In addition to helping victims of natural disasters and being useful for camping trips, the cookpot could provide citizens of developing countries with a method of charging mobile phones, even if electricity is spotty. The device went on sale this month in Japan for $300.
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Genius!
it takes 3-5 hours to charge an iphone... hopefully you've got water to spare.
This is a stroke of genius. I would buy this in a second if they made if for the Samsung Galaxy S.
Of course! Charge your iphone while making a pot of strong tea! (Very strong tea)
Do they have a pot that can also repair/power the cell phone towers in a natural disaster- no? Well at least we can take pictures and play angry birds while we wait.
$300? Deforest some more land to get wood to burn? Gee sounds like a great idea (not)!
Why not just a simple parabolic solar reflector with a thermoelectric junction?
This article is so wrong on so many fronts.
Hopefully just because the idea came about by watching people during a natural disaster, that wasn't its intent, because as pointed out you need cell towers (with power) for cell phones to work.
Not mention in a natural disaster there is not guarantee that you will be walking around with the device, so are you going to go back to your caved in home to get it? If so I can certainly think of better things to stash for to prepare for a disaster.
But even pushing on to use if for camping. Your camping and you use your cell phone so much (or are out for so long) the batteries are not enough? But you have 6 hours of tending a fire, with water boiling, (with what wood?). Lot of work it seems. It seems small so that might be a factor, but size isn't too much of a problem you can get a solar panel to charge it in 3 hours, and it costs less, and you don't have to provide the fuel to keep the fire going or to tend it.
Personally I would say that if you are going to go to all the trouble to have something like this or the solar panel around, just buy some extra batteries and charge them up and use the phone for only emergencies, not to gab with your buddies 24/7.
@ Nevets Have you ever been camping? Seriously you don't bring in bulldozers to deforest the place for some firewood. Most collected firewood is from dead/fallen trees since it is dry!! And if there are situations where there are little to no dead wood then cutting limbs off a tree can suffice which is a hell of a lot easier than chopping down trees. And in the event of extended camping a tree(that is singular as in 1 mind you)may need to chopped down which creates a lot of wood provisions that last a long time. This device is only using wasted energy(heat) using a peltier device and converting it into electricity. And as for your parabolic solar reflector what if there is a low index of solar light or it is night time and there is no solar light? I'll tell you the answer would be to cook using(wait for it...wait for it)FIRE! I mean I commend you on thinking outside the box but damn you have your foot in your mouth and your head up your ass.
Why not use it for home use? missing an outlet? here's the solution!! And for everybody that is complaining about cutting down trees, this is suppose to be an emergency use thing or a camping thing. How often do you get caught in an emergency or go camping that you realy think you'll need this? Hmm? I mean good idea, but this should be an alternate. and as @OccultAssasin , yes, I agree realy that it is gonna be used when you are cooking and you really dont need you phone when you are camping.... thats sort of the point...