The next time you go camping, you might be able to charge your mobile phone by boiling water on your campfire. And you can thank Japan’s earthquakes.

The Hatsuden-Nabe thermo-electric cookpot turns heat from boiling water into electricity. In the wake of the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that left hundreds of thousands of people homeless, the Osaka-based company TES NewEnergy developed a campfire cookpot that generates electricity at power levels that enable the charging of simple mobile devices like smartphones.

The pot uses a ceramic thermo-electric material that generates electrical flow due to the temperature differentials between the bottom of the pot and the boiling water, inside. It can charge a cell phone in 3 to 5 hours — and heat up your lunch at the same time.

TES NewEnergy developed this solution to aid in disaster relief, but the company also develops ways to live more efficiently, such as generating electricity from residual waste heat in industrial facilities.

Tags: boiling | campfire | cookpot | disaster | electricity | Hatsuden-Nabe | NewEnergy | relief | thermo-electric | water

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