Greens Give Thumbs Up To GSMA's Universal Phone Charger
"We've been at this for three years, evangelizing the need for interoperable power supplies," said Paul Panepinto, sales and marketing chief at San Ramon, Calif.-based Green Plug. "Without a doubt, things need to happen more quickly. It personally offends me that the average user [of CE products] throws away 300 power adapters in their lifetime."
At the GSMA's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, on Tuesday, the industry group said that 17 of its members have agreed to a universal charging solution (UCS) for mobile phones based around Micro-USB as the charging interface. Green Plug, manufacturer of a "universal connector" that pairs any electronic device with any power supply, hopes the GMSA and bodies like the Open Handset Alliance will call for similar standards for other devices -- from printers to cordless power tools, Panepinto said.
Why all the concern? The company cites recent studies that found 3.2 billion new power supplies being manufactured worldwide in 2008 even as some two billion older ones were going into landfill.
"Nobody benefits from this, not consumers, not manufacturers, not the environment," Panepinto said.
To achieve more standardization like Tuesday's GSMA initiative, he's hoping Green Plug can secure a big-name vendor win for its GreenTalk protocol.
"We need a major adopter to drive this market forward. We have to get to a tipping point and others will follow. We hope that HP and Sony are listening. We hope Wal-Mart puts up a quote [supporting Green Plug's efforts] on our Web site," Panepinto said.