Promise of universal mobile phone charger

One universal charging solution for all new mobile phones by 2012, was the commitment announced by the Groupe Speciale Mobile Association (GSMA) and 17 mobile operators and manufacturers earlier this week.

The universal Micro-USB charger is bound to be welcomed by travellers. It’ll make life so much easier for families, who often have to bring 3-4 chargers, if all family members want to keep their mobiles powered, when on holiday.

Those of us who occasionally forget our charger at home may also find it easier to find a kind soul, who will lend us their charger. With a bit of luck maybe we can also get hotels to provide the universal charger in all rooms, so we can leave our mobile chargers at home?

More importantly the new charger will be more energy-efficient than current chargers. If the entire mobile industry adopts the common format, we could see a “50 per cent reduction in standby energy consumption [and] the potential elimination of up to 51,000 tonnes of duplicate chargers” says the GSMA.

The GSMA initiative comes after the EU has been calling for uniform, more energy efficient external power supplies  for a number of years (see  EU web site (PDF) ).

TAGS: mobile chargers, travel