Japan gadget charges cellphone over campfire

TOKYO — A Japanese company has come up with a new way to charge your mobile phone after a natural disaster or in the great outdoors — by heating a pot of water over a campfire.

The Hatsuden-Nabe thermo-electric cookpot turns heat from boiling water into electricity that feeds via a USB port into digital devices such as smartphones, music players and global positioning systems.

TES NewEnergy, based in the western city of Osaka, started selling the gadget in Japan this month for 24,150 yen ($299), and plans to market it later in developing countries with patchy power grids.

Chief executive Kazuhiro Fujita said the invention was inspired by Japan’s March 11 earthquake and tsunami that left 23,000 people dead or missing, devastated the northeast region and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

“When I saw the TV footage of the quake victims making a fire to keep themselves warm, I came up with the idea of helping them to charge their mobile phones at the same time,” Fujita said.

The pot features strips of ceramic thermoelectric material that generate electricity through temperature differentials between the 550 degrees Celsius at the bottom of the pot and the water boiling inside at 100 degrees… Read More [via google]