Swedish start-up MyFC has developed a new environmentally friendly smartphone charger that uses the power of fuel cell energy to charge your smartphone battery. Jaq, the charger, consists of a colourful rubber sleeve and a credit card-sized "power card" that contains saltwater.
To produce energy, Jaq converts the chemical energy from saltwater into electricity through a chemical reaction of hydrogen ions with oxygen. The chemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen results in green electricity.
To charge your device using Jaq, the user needs to insert a power card that contains saltwater, which fuels electricity-producing chemical reactions when you slip the card into the port. The device is portable and it meets international air safety regulations.
MyFC says that JAQ is the smallest pocket-sized fuel cell charger in the world. “We have created the world’s most powerful fuel cell that’s actually portable,” says CEO, Bjorn Westerholm.
One Jaq power card produces enough energy to fully charge the average smartphone. The saltwater-containing power cards are unfortunately good for just one use.
Jaq is another charger in the slew of portable, eco-friendly devices designed to power smartphones. Rachid Yazami, a researcher from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, has developed a new chip that is able to charge a smartphone in less than 10 minutes and a group of researchers at China’s Peking University in Beijing have invented a small generator that uses the human body as an electrode to power devices without requiring batteries.
