PowerTrekk makes electricity from water

PowerTrekk is a small mobile phone charger that produces its own electricity through a chemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen.

The charger uses disposable pucks with a substance that separates the hydrogen from water, which are poured in during use. The only waste product in the energy production process is water vapor. The charger weighs 240 grams and also contains an internal 1500mAh lithium-ion battery that is pre-charged via the wall socket.

The alternative for us who often find ourselves in places without two holes in the wall is to carry batteries or use a portable solar panel, so at first glance a Powertrekk would be interesting as batteries weigh a lot and the sun often goes into clouds in our latitudes.

After testing the charger, however, you realize that a puck weighs 33 grams and contains four watt-hours of energy, but it is almost the same power and you get out of a lithium-ion battery with the same weight. The pucks cost about SEK 50 each and could be reusable but there is currently no process for this. A PowerTrekk also costs 2000 SEK in purchase.

No matter how fun it is to make electricity from water, and no matter how impressed Obama was with the charger during his visit to Stockholm, he concludes that this is not a good solution. Another limitation is that the charger cannot be used while traveling as the manufacturer advises against using it in a pocket or backpack.

If even an outdoor technology nerd like me can't find a reason to use it, it's still possible that a purchase will support a company that is hopefully committed to developing the technology into something of real use in the future.