Photos via Women of Uganda Network
Here is a great example of two things: ingenuity and resourcefulness, and why affordable renewable energy chargers are important to develop.
After riding her bicycle 20 miles to get to a location where she could charge her mobile phone, a Ugandan woman was duped - getting her phone returned to her with an old battery that could barely hold a charge instead of her original battery.
But she put her thinking cap on and devised her own solution to her charging woes.
"I looked at what was readily available to me and came up with my own charger. I devised this method to enable me charge my battery every day. It works perfectly."
What she saw when she looked around was an abundance of D batteries used in her village for flashlights and radios. She bundled 5 together, took the plug off her cell phone charging cord, and touched the wires to the terminals of the batteries to charge up.
While the solution works great for her, it's not so great environmentally speaking in that a whole lot of batteries will get used up and tossed just to charge up a cell phone that can barely hold a charge in the first place.
This is why getting small renewable energy chargers to rural areas is so important. Imagine not only this woman being able to charge up her phone without a hassle, but her whole village being able to ditch the batteries and use the sun to power their flashlights and radios.
Via Women of Uganda Network
More on Renewable Energy in Rural Areas:
CES 2009: LG and GotWind's Mobile Phone Charging Station (Video)
Solar Powered Refrigerator Could Bring Health and Energy Savings to Rural India
UNEP Bringing Solar Power Into India's Rural Mainstream
Motorola Sponsors Solar-Powered Kiosks to Charge Phones in Rural Uganda