Slashdot is powered by your submissions, so send in your scoop

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
IOS Power Iphone

iOS 16 To Gain 'Clean Energy Charging' Option Later This Year (macrumors.com) 117

In an update coming to iOS 16 later this year, Apple plans to add a new "Clean Energy Charging" option in the United States. MacRumors reports: The information was shared in Apple's iOS 16 press release, and it says that clean energy charging will optimize charging times for when the grid is using cleaner energy sources. With Clean Energy Charging, Apple is aiming to decrease the carbon footprint of the iPhone. This is the first we've heard of clean energy charging, and it's not a feature that Apple has previously highlighted.
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

iOS 16 To Gain 'Clean Energy Charging' Option Later This Year

Comments Filter:
  • I see (Score:4, Funny)

    by nospam007 ( 722110 ) * on Monday September 12, 2022 @08:29PM (#62876141)

    So, just like the Diesel fuel, the electricity will come in 3 different colors, clear, red or blue, but with an additional 'green'?

    • California and Texas have learned the hard way about peak energy usage bringing down even the SMARTGrid tech. So, it's smart to say "I'll charge later..." during an 8 hour sleep.

      There's electronic publishing of the energy rate in CA... but is this ready to implement any where else?

      • Re:I see (Score:5, Informative)

        by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @09:45PM (#62876295)

        it's smart to say "I'll charge later..." during an 8 hour sleep.

        The amount of energy needed to charge an iPhone is negligible.

        The problem is silly "feel-good" options make people think they are "doing their part" to mitigate global warming and can then feel smug while continuing to drive a 4-ton SUV.

        • My four ton Model X charges at night after businesses and industry wind down. Thank you very much. One iPhone wont make a difference, but 10,000,000 iPhones in CA would, as would the 3,000,000 MacBook Pros, if they came with an option. With Apple, there is scale. Jack ass.
          • With Apple, there is scale. Jack ass.

            How does the scale of Apple compare with the scale of air conditioners and electric showers?

            Pot. Meet a huge fuckoff kettle.

            • As long as I can turn it OFF...when I plug something in, I generally am very low and need it charged up NOW asap....

              My cell phone is my only phone, and I do not wish to be without it for emergencies.

              This statement caught my eye and puzzled me:

              How does the scale of Apple compare with the scale of air conditioners and electric showers?

              What is an "electric shower"...?

              Sounds dangerous, electricity and water mixing together?

              • What is an "electric shower"...?

                Sounds dangerous, electricity and water mixing together?

                Electric water heaters are quite common in the USA, I believe.

                If you go to south America the electricity is often mixed with the water, it might even be the majority of showers in some places.

                Google "suicide shower" for details.

                • Electric water heaters are quite common in the USA, I believe.

                  Ah....you were talking water heaters, I didn't get that from "electric shower"...

                  It's not a term used over here in the US.

                  Funny how so similar, but so different in some ways in the language.

                  The South America thing...wow! I'll have to look up suicide shower for sure!

                  Where I live, and almost everywhere I've lived in the south or southeast of the US, I've always had natural gas piped into my house and that is used for my central heating, water

                  • There are homes that don't have natural gas service, so they have electric appliances - electric water heater, electric heat pump, electric range / oven.

                    Sure, you may prefer gas, but you may not prefer it when you see what it costs to have natgas service added to your house if it wasn't there at construction. At the very least, you have to:
                    - trench your lawn to put in the service line.
                    - Add the meter, though this is usually paid for by the gas company
                    - cut a hole in your foundation for the service line to

                    • It's easily several tens of thousands of dollars to retrofit gas service onto an existing home.

                      If I'm in a city with gas available...

                      I'd NEVER buy a house that didn't already have natural gas.

                      I love to cook, it's very important to me...so, I want a gas range stovetop.

                      That's a big checkmark on my home search.

                    • It absolutely was for us too, when we moved out of that home. Cooking on a gas range is just better, and gas-fired tankless water heaters are amazing. I wish this house had a gas furnace for heating as well, but instead they opted for a variable-speed electric heat pump which gets the job done for the mild climate.

              • by dryeo ( 100693 )

                I think they mean an inline electric water heater instead of a hot water tank. No buffering so every time you turn the hot water tap, the heater kicks in at high wattage.
                https://duckduckgo.com/?q=inli... [duckduckgo.com]

          • Re: I see (Score:5, Insightful)

            by ArmoredDragon ( 3450605 ) on Tuesday September 13, 2022 @01:03AM (#62876551)

            Little do you realize that's actually the wrong time of the day. In fact, you're probably burning natural gas to charge that.

            https://www.energy.ca.gov/data... [ca.gov]

            The reason California's grid sucks is because they're stuck on stupid. The only thing they're actually building more of is solar which, big shocker, starts getting less effective around 4PM, exactly the time of day that they experience energy shortages. What's funny about this whole thing is that California produces surplus energy during the day. Too much, in fact. To avoid overloading their grid, they pay the neighboring states to take it, and then in the evening they have to start importing energy from those states, that they also then have to pay for.

            https://www.latimes.com/projec... [latimes.com]

            And part of the problem is that California's energy demand is so bad at that time of the day, that they're threatening to cause blackouts for Arizona residents because we have to send them too much of that sweet nuclear and hydro power just to stay afloat.

            https://thefederalist.com/2021... [thefederalist.com]

            So, how did California and its neighbors arrive at this point? Because California’s electricity goals measure net use of electricity by source, it allows California politicians to virtuously claim they are “greener” than they really are.

            They do this by generating a surplus of subsidized solar power during mild days. This surplus electricity is priced to sell, as there is often more supply than demand in California. As a result, California frequently exports cheap electricity to other states in the middle of the day. This has depressed the value of baseload power generation, discouraging needed new investment and causing the premature retirement of gas and coal powerplants.

            Unfortunately, I'm moving to Los Angeles very soon, so I'll be part of the problem. In my very specific circumstances, the pros outweigh the cons. Basically no point in voting though; too many other people there think California's legislature is perfectly fine instead of being the shit show that it really is. They think the police haven't yet been sufficiently de-funded and that they don't yet have enough solar power. But you can't tell any of them how stupid that is or else you'll end up on the wrong side of cancel culture. Free speech is frowned upon by progressives.

          • 10MM iPhones is shifting maybe 50MW. That is about what Tesla's Virtual Power Plant provided utilizing thousands of Powerwall batteries, so similarly it is something. The scale of the problem is more in the GW range though, so much more is still needed.

            Small steps do add up, but I would still call this greenwashing.

        • "The amount of energy needed to charge an iPhone is negligible."

          Exactly.
          People can't even be bothered to put a charging cable in, they prefer putting it on a electricity-beaming plate that wastes more energy than it transmits.

          • by Xenx ( 2211586 )

            electricity-beaming plate that wastes more energy than it transmits.

            There is nothing wrong with disliking wireless charging, they are definitely less efficient, but at least be honest about it. They only use around 40% more power. That is still a lot of waste, but definitely less than the 100+% more you claim.

        • The problem is silly "feel-good" options make people think they are "doing their part" to mitigate global warming and can then feel smug while continuing to drive a 4-ton SUV.

          No, the problem is the Apple greenwashing department pretending they're a company that cares and telling you you'll be helping to save the planet if you buy Apple products.

          Then when you go to the Apple store they'll upsell you an energy wasting wireless charger so you don't have to go to the huge effort of connecting a cable.

        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          The amount of energy needed to charge an iPhone is negligible.

          An iPhone, yes. A million iPhones, not so much.

          Actually that's a massive under-estimate. As of 2018, the most recent stat I could find in 5 seconds, they had sold 2.2 billion iPhones. Obviously many are now eWaste, but today there must be at least hundreds of millions of active ones out there.

          • As of 2018, the most recent stat I could find in 5 seconds, they had sold 2.2 billion iPhones. Obviously many are now eWaste, but today there must be at least hundreds of millions of active ones out there.

            ...and we haven't even started talking about the much larger number of Android devices out there and the effect this tech would have if they integrated it too.

          • Two billion is probably total global shipments?

            To make it easy, let's say 300 million Americans currently use a smartphone. Charging a 15Wh battery daily that's 4.5GWh. That's a large coal power plant running for 2-3 hours, just to charge everyone's phones.

            • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

              Right, and smartphones are ideally placed to make use of excess energy when available, because they almost always have a network connection.

              • Unfortunately they aren't always connected to the power :) Even though I'm at a desk all day, I usually don't plug in the phone (or put it on the wireless charger) because I do get up and walk around occasionally, so it makes more sense to just slow charge it overnight, when solar power is non-existent.

                I suppose that's mostly a habit that can be adjusted of course, there's no reason I can't plug it in for two hours during the day of course.

                • If you constantly connect and disconnect it from the charger, you will wear out the connectors and offset any environmental benefit.
                • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

                  Around here the price of electricity used to go negative, there was so much wind power at night. People got wise to it so it doesn't happen much any more, everything is charging their stuff on the cheap.

        • it's smart to say "I'll charge later..." during an 8 hour sleep.

          The amount of energy needed to charge an iPhone is negligible.

          The problem is silly "feel-good" options make people think they are "doing their part" to mitigate global warming and can then feel smug while continuing to drive a 4-ton SUV.

          The amount of energy needed to charge an iPhone is negligible, the amount of energy needed to charge millions of them isn't, the charge needed to charge another 8 times that number of Android devices as well is even less negligible. Put this tech into everything from electric vehicles through laptops and to biometric padlocks and you have a significant benefit. It all depends on how completely you are willing to redesign the electric distribution system and the devices that use it, that and realising that t

          • This technology is already in laptops and has been for at least a decade as far as I know. In fact it's been in iPhones forever as well. Current iPhones use a charging strategy that optimized for battery longevity which is what they should continue to do.

            Laptops do the same but, because they use more electricity, also have mechanisms to shift charging times to when power is generally cheapest.

        • Indeed. And, more importantly, current iPhone models use "optimized charging" to maximize battery life when charged overnight. If that's changed for "greenest energy" charging and it reduces the useful life of the battery, it might not even be a net positive.
        • Yeah I'm not usually one to criticize people making small changes that do a little bit not nothing but this is just godawful wank.

      • I'll believe California and Texas are serious about lowering CO2 emissions when they start building nuclear power plants.

        Putting up onshore windmills isn't a bad idea, it's low cost, low in CO2 emissions, and when paired with some hydro to manage the mismatch between wind and electrical demand it's a reliable system. Then again most anything paired with hydro is a good idea. Hydro is also low cost, low in CO2 emissions, and can act quickly to changes in electrical demand. Add some pumped hydro storage fo

        • Who knows... it might happen. The problem is that you cannot do it for less than $10B, and the only way it is marginally economically viable is if it runs at a 95% capacity factor selling energy at ~$75-85/MWh. If that capacity factor is reduced because other sources are cheaper or lower impact or whatever then it goes to shit.

          So, you need to pair it with a huge load, like a desalinisation plant (which in turn becomes less economically viable since it has to run at a capacity factor under 50%). You also

        • Part of CA's energy problem is that there's nowhere to put a power plant left in the state... they've fully developed all usable land. So, there's no way to avoid importing power an unfavorable rates.

      • So, it's smart to say "I'll charge later..." during an 8 hour sleep.

        Yes that is smart, but that is not green. Nighttime is not when your solar and wind capacity is at its peak production and it makes up a tiny portion of the dirty dirty cheap off-peak energy going into iPhone.

        Oh I forgot to say pathetically small amount of energy in the above sentence. You can slot that in wherever you think it mocks this idea best.

        Apple is off the deep end. Time to fire some dead weight staff.

    • So, just like the Diesel fuel, the electricity will come in 3 different colors, clear, red or blue, but with an additional 'green'?

      Mmmm, not quite. I'm guessing most people interpret a Fuck-You-Not-Charging-Now iOS "feature" as shit brown in color.

      Tends to match the "green" claims spewing out of politicians mouths as they lobby for more carbon credits for those of high societal importance. Also known as themselves.

      • Mmmm, not quite. I'm guessing most people interpret a Fuck-You-Not-Charging-Now iOS "feature" as shit brown in color.

        That gives "brown out" a new meaning.

        If I'm even given the option to have my utility pay me to delay the running of my air conditioner, or whatever, to conserve the electrical grid then I'd consider putting in a large UPS for those items that the utility would lock out on me. There's still plenty of overhead power lines around here that get taken out from wind, ice, and curious furry woodland critters so it is to my benefit to have a plan for a lengthy power outage. If I can get the utility to help fund a

  • Will it be available in a greenwash color?

    • Will it be available in a greenwash color?

      Yes. Apparently Apple offers their iProducts in greenwashed colors.

  • by systemd-anonymousd ( 6652324 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @08:39PM (#62876165)

    The carbon footprint of the iPhone is 99.999% mining, refining, manufacturing, distribution, and e-waste. The amount of carbon it produces when sipping energy off the grid is like an eyedropper of fresh water squirted into the saltwater ocean.

    • I don't trust your statisics.
      They are probably way off.
      Probably you have no data to back it.

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      We can easily calculate this. An iPhone 14 has a 3,000mAh battery (a bit more gross capacity, 3k is a reasonable estimate of the usable amount).

      Let's say the user charges every day, putting 10Wh into it. Some energy is lost to heat, in the charger and in the phone. Typical efficiency from wall to battery is around 50% for a fast charger. So 20Wh total consumed, every day.

      7.3 kWh per year. Not huge but not insignificant. Likely much more than 0.001% of the total lifetime emissions, unless your energy is rene

      • by Zak3056 ( 69287 )

        I think the GP is probably off by a few orders of magnitude, but let's take this to its logical conclusion: If we assume the average lifespan of the phone is three years, that 7.3 kWh totals out to around 22 kWh. At $0.25/kWh (significantly more than I pay in east Tennessee, but this thread says California a lot, so I marked it up) that's about $5.50 worth of electricity. While certainly not a perfect proxy, the cost of building the device should be roughly analogous to the energy that goes into building

        • I'm relieved my linguistic device of throwing 9s at the percentage wasn't that far from a back-of-the-envelope estimation. You also have to consider the e-waste cost, and though it costs ~$570 to produce the iPhone, much of that production takes place in countries that are notoriously inconsiderate of the environment. So the $5.50 in US energy might not be on the same emissions scale as the $570 mostly spent in China, etc.

  • Well, it's not green energy time, so I guess I will let my phone go dead until green energy time appears sometime in the future. Yeah, sign me up for that!

    Talk about dumb ideas.

  • Assuage Your Guilt (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dgatwood ( 11270 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @08:42PM (#62876171) Homepage Journal

    Assuage some of your guilt over using 1/3rd again more power to charge wirelessly by using 12% green energy instead of 10%. Sure, your phone will only be half charged most days, and you might not make it to noon, but that's a small price to pay for the smugness of knowing you're damaging the environment slightly less than your other wireless-charging peers.

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Tuesday September 13, 2022 @04:11AM (#62876787) Homepage Journal

      A much more useful feature would be if you could limit charging to 80%. OnePlus and some other manufacturers offer that feature, but Apple doesn't. They have a battery saver mode but all it does is delay charging to 100% until just before you get up in the morning.

      That would not only be good for the consumer, it would extend the useful lifetime of the battery greatly, keeping them out of eWaste.

    • by GoRK ( 10018 )

      Never mind the effect of a few hundred million iOS devices synchronizing their grid power draw.

      • by dgatwood ( 11270 )

        Never mind the effect of a few hundred million iOS devices synchronizing their grid power draw.

        The hilarious thing would be if they added so much load that they had to bring more peaker plants online that wouldn't have been needed if they spread the load out through the night — even more hilarious if they then detect that the power isn't green enough, stop charging, and end up spinning that plant up and down over and over again at a huge loss of efficiency. :-D

        Seriously, choosing when to charge based on the greenness of the power seems like a *really* dumb idea, because most green energy curtai

  • Perspective (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Dan East ( 318230 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @08:51PM (#62876197) Journal

    The iPhone 13 has a battery capacity of 12.41 Wh. Note that is not kilowatt-hour, but watt-hour. The average electric stove is 3,000 watts. In other words, the energy your stove consumes in 15 seconds is enough power to charge a totally dead iPhone to 100%.

    Bringing water to boil and let it boil an extra 3 minutes before you put the food in? You could have fully charged 12 iPhones with that energy. Let's not even get into microwaves, air conditioning, hair dryers, etc.

    I don't think charging iPhones at specific times of day is going to make any appreciable (let alone measurable) difference in CO2 emissions.

    • A quick search shows 113 million iPhone users in the USA...

      • by MrLogic17 ( 233498 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @09:02PM (#62876229) Journal

        Now do stoves, plus clothes dryers, plus air conditioning units, plus hair dryers.
         

        • by DontBeAMoran ( 4843879 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @09:22PM (#62876253)

          You can save money by drying your hair in the clothes dryer. After a few months of practice, you'll barely get bruises anymore.

        • Everyone charging their smartphones every day is around 4.5GWh. It's far from insignificant, that's the output of several hours of a very large coal plant for example.

          • Everyone charging their smartphones every day is around 4.5GWh. It's far from insignificant, that's the output of several hours of a very large coal plant for example.

            There's 113million iPhone users. The iPhone has an ~12Wh battery which amounts to 1.356GWh every day. If fully charged.
            People don't fully charge their phones every night. Ultra heavy users may. The normal user typically uses only a fraction of that capacity which means ultimately we're talking more like 0.5GWh.

            The USA consumes 11600GWh daily. Your 0.5GWh is incredibly insignificant. Hell man your original 4.5GWh is insignificant. And that's before we even start discussing the small percentage of a differenc

        • Plus the giant ass (electric) SUV which pairs so well with the iPhone 13 pro max ultra turbo.

          I reserve the right to be bigoted about computer matters.

      • A quick search shows 113 million iPhone users in the USA...

        How many of those are charging their phones all at once? Most people have a phone with them through the day.

        In fact I would say that most people are already using very friendly times to charge phones since probably most of those millions of people plug in to charge late at night.

      • A quick search shows 113 million iPhone users in the USA...

        There's easily that many hairdryers, stoves, and people taking long showers.

        Don't even get started on how many air conditioners there are.

        • Don't even get started on how many air conditioners there are.

          They're pretty much a necessity of life where I live and many other places.

          Here, my weather dictates that my AC turns on about mid April or so...and doesn't really click off till early/mid November.

          It's hot and muggy here...gotta have AC.

          ON the other hand...I rarely turn the heat on in winter.

          • Be lucky you don't live in Canada. For a lot of us, the electric bill for the AC in the spring/summer simply pales in comparison to heating in fall/winter.

            • Be lucky you don't live in Canada. For a lot of us, the electric bill for the AC in the spring/summer simply pales in comparison to heating in fall/winter.

              LOL...I don't like cold weather...hence, not living up north.

      • A quick search shows 113 million iPhone users in the USA...

        Now, imagine all the e-waste produced as millions of people run out to get a new iPhone so it can run this new software to save on CO2 emissions.

        • Score: +5, Sad but true.

          On the other hand, just because a big something is a lot more bad than a small something doesn't mean we shouldn't do the small thing. Also, not everyone changes their phone every year. And the replaced phone often goes to another family member, so really it can take quite a long time before a phone is discarded - even then, it may be sold to someone else who will use it, etc.

    • by edwdig ( 47888 )

      Who cares. It's a fairly trivial feature to implement. The iPhone has known your usage patterns and sleep schedule for years and optimized around that. Adding charging to the mix is nothing. Most people put their phone on the charger when they go to bed, and pick it up about 8 hours later. The charge is going to take like an hour. If the phone decides its slight better to shift the charging time to a little later in the 8 hour window, great. Costs almost nothing to implement, makes no visible difference to

  • If this ain't some shit marketing shit. Who falls for this?

    Apple could at least sell it's customers a solar charging station so that there is some truth in advertising. Maybe on cloudy days your Apple device won't charge, and if it is cloudy for three days you might as well stay home and cry.
  • by MacMann ( 7518492 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @09:22PM (#62876255)

    How much CO2 is saved by delaying the charging of an Apple iProduct? Maybe with the most power hungry laptop this is 200 watts which translates into barely measurable CO2 emissions. With an iProduct using the charger that came in the box it's more like 25 watts. The option to delay charging for when the energy is "clean" sounds like a band-aid on a gunshot wound, a teeny tiny fix for a much larger problem of using "dirty" energy to begin with.

    I suggest we look for energy that is both low in cost and low in CO2 emissions so we aren't looking for silly tricks like this from our iProducts. We have studies to tell us where to get that energy. One such study came out of the IPCC: https://www.ipcc.ch/site/asset... [www.ipcc.ch]

    What are the options that are low in CO2 and also lower in cost than coal and natural gas? Geothermal, hydro, nuclear fission, and onshore wind. Of course the costs could vary considerably by location, and the study, because not everyone gets the same kind of wind, rain, or whatever but on the whole at least one of those four options are going to be available for every habitable place on the planet. If there are exceptions to that then they must be exceedingly rare. If the place is too dry for hydro, has too little (or I guess too much) wind for a windmill, and whatever else might be going on to prevent a "clean" power station to be built then it is not likely for people to be living there. Since we operate nuclear power plants in such inhospitable places as a hundred feet or so beneath the Arctic Ocean then we can probably figure out ways to get a nuclear power plant working most anywhere we have people. It's really expensive to have people living under the sea which can make the expense of running a nuclear power plant not really a cost issue. If someone wants to live where the scenery and climate is exceptional then spending a bit higher rates on electricity isn't likely to factor in much. That place might not be so exceptional to live if the electricity comes from fossil fuels. People in less than exceptional places might not like the sight of windmills on the horizon (or maybe they find it pleasant), or they don't like the steam coming off a geothermal power plant, but that's going to be better for the air quality and their health long term. Given the IPCC studies the costs when compared to fossil fuels are likely to be lower, or just a tiny bit higher where the clean air is worth the added expense.

    Why is it put on the average consumer to figure out how to keep our electricity supply "clean"? Shouldn't that be the responsibility of the utility and/or government? I can understand that in exceptional circumstances that we might need alerts going out to people for keeping electricity demand low, or similar for other public services. An example might be a water main breaking so alerts go out to conserve water, and also to boil whatever water is for drinking since it could have been contaminated. If this becomes a daily occurrence, to the point we program our phones to limit charging to certain times of the day, then that is a failure on a very fundamental function of our utilities and governments to build and maintain our electrical supply. Not only is this a sign of a larger failure but also a mostly symbolic fix since our portable electronics take so little power.

    I guess when your company sells products based on conspicuous consumption like Apple does then your products are going to do silly things like schedule the time it charges for when the sun shines and wind blows. Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. But then, again, this is a market where BS like this could make a big difference on the quarterly sales reports.

  • by WaffleMonster ( 969671 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @09:33PM (#62876265)

    Between boundless ESG carbon offset scams and equally worthless "green" consumer marketing scams all the noise is doing is causing people to tune out.

  • How does an electric device knows you are using a clean, green energy versus a coal/diesel based energy? Does the utility company sends data over the power lines, or is this something added by the solar panels and whole home battery systems?

  • by imcdona ( 806563 ) on Monday September 12, 2022 @09:51PM (#62876303)
    Because it's more environmentally friendly to have to buy two cables, one dedicated for iPhones, and another that works with everything else.
  • This is probably worthwhile, when looked at from the point of view of there being hundreds of millions of phones being charged every day.

    In New Zealand some power companies have plans that charge you a little more during peak times, but give you a good discount outside the peaks. Electric Kiwi MoveMaster https://www.electrickiwi.co.nz... [electrickiwi.co.nz] and Octopus Energy https://octopusenergy.nz/ [octopusenergy.nz] are two examples, with Electric Kiwi also giving you one free hour of off-peak power each day. Typically shoulder period power

    • by colfer ( 619105 )

      Probably the best comment here. But I'll follow up with a probably ridiculous one. I would like one of these on my roof (pumped storage with turbine): https://www.sciencedirect.com/... [sciencedirect.com]

      • by colfer ( 619105 )

        (Turbines are amazing machines, one of the places where physics meets engineering in a proven fashion. We all know it from flying, but I visited an old style coal-fired power plant. The entire floor for the steam generator was occupied by a turbine about 60 feet long, alone on a gigantic empty floor. The old style metal switches and transformers crammed onto the floor below were denser than any action-movie-in-an-industrial-plant. And the boiler next door was 15 stories high, attached to a 1/4-mile duct to

        • by colfer ( 619105 )

          (Solar of course is pure physics. The cells are reversed diodes, light-absorbing and opposed to light-emitting, all based on semi-stable electron shells - err, clouds - which make no sense without the quantum integer nature of reality at that scale.)

  • Hmmm.... (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Why does this sound like some dodgy way for Apple to try and offset the company's carbon footprint by stealing credits from their users?

  • Launch an ad campaign laughing at Apple for doing this, then will print a link on a piece of cardboard included with the phone to permit users to sign up.

  • So let's take a more charitable view of this:

    1. Apple didn't announce this at one of their shiny events. Hell, it's almost the last item in this press release. They know it's not that big of a deal, and they aren't touting it as a way to save the planet.
    2. The CO2 savings may be low, but the effort to implement the feature is also low.
    3. iOS is Apple's flagship. Features to MacOS are often added after they're added to iOS. This could just be the start.
    4. Your iPhone's clean charging cycle could be used as a

  • does that include nuclear ?
    if not, they're missing something.

  • So, Chinese style social credits making their way into our lives through the back door. Tell me this Apple, how will your know when (as I do already), I charge my gadgets 100% off grid using my solar charged battery pack here in the UK? None of my devices know where they are receiving their charge energy from. Will you be sharing this info with the Bidet administration, and will those who do not use efficient charging methods receive a knock on the door from one of your self appointed Stazi?
  • This is just bullocks as the system doesn't know when 'clean/green energy' is coming out of the socket.
    • > This is just bullocks as the system doesn't know when 'clean/green energy' is coming out of the socket.

      It could. There's an API that power generators use.

  • For anyone knowing how an electricity grid works, this is utter bullsh*t. Let's assume all the iPhones start charging simultaneously when only 100% feel-good renewable energy is being put in the grid. The accumulated load is likely to cause an imbalance and some other energy source has to pick up the change to keep the 50Hz (or 60Hz). Also, you can't direct an electron; it is all a mix of renewables and not-renewables. Besides, all the rare earth they are mining to produce new phones impacts our planet way
  • Ironic because each release of iOS uses more power. I bought the cheapest iPhone available new from Apple at the time, running iOS 14. Battery time went down with iOS 15 and seems to be down with iOS 16 (released yesterday). Other than that, good phone.

  • ..and eliminate the middle-man.
  • Basically, you'll have to charge your phone during the daytime unlike everyone who uses a mobile phone.

  • by codeButcher ( 223668 ) on Wednesday September 14, 2022 @06:59AM (#62880461)
    From reading the highest scored posts, it seems to me that "charging" here refers to Apple billing its customers, more than it relates to the transfer of electricity to a battery.

Genius is ten percent inspiration and fifty percent capital gains.

Working...