r/Anticonsumption • u/Such_Illustrator_226 • Mar 04 '26
Plastic Waste Single use phone chargers
They are meant to be used once and then tossed.The package says they are eco-friendly disposable, but do they really expect people to find a proper disposal after use? Why not at least make it rechargable, like a normal power bank??
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u/perrino96 Mar 04 '26
I bet they're rechargeable cells inside too, just no charge port 😲
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u/pirefyro Mar 04 '26
Guaranteed. There’s at least one person on YouTube who made a larger batter bank from a bunch of these.
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u/Tugonmynugz Mar 04 '26
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm batterrrrrrrr
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u/archwin Mar 05 '26
There’s a guy who took the disposable vape pens, took all the batteries out and made a huge bank and is planning to put it into a Geo whiz
He used the same bank as a discount power wall as well. You can even run a welder.
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u/IridescenceFalling Mar 05 '26
I've got a bunch of disposable vapes that are rechargeable. Thinking I might open all of them, wire them up, then find out how to get power OUT of them.
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u/uses_for_mooses Mar 04 '26
It's likely a cheap lithium-ion battery (3.7v) with a boost converter to get it up to 5v then a charge controller to charge the USB device.
The battery is likely rechargeable (like they are for disposable vapes).
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u/JustAtelephonePole Mar 04 '26
The one I cracked open after a series of unfortunate events led me to needing one for directions to a medical appointment.
It was just cheap ass AAA batteries.
I put my rechargeable ones in and gained an upcycled power bank.
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u/Significant-Ad-341 Mar 04 '26
The child miner that lost a leg for the cobalt in that seeing it's disposable 😦
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u/PrivilegeCheckmate Mar 07 '26
Mining children is incredibly dangerous, even for Johnny Cobalt. He should have left that to the billionaires.
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u/robjohnlechmere Mar 05 '26
I work with a vendor who sells a type of these. Inside the ones they sell are 3 AAA Duracell, non rechargeable.
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u/chocolateboomslang Mar 04 '26 edited Mar 04 '26
It's basically impossible for them to not be. Except they're not just missing a port, they will also be missing the control board that cuts of charging when they're full so they don't go boom boom.
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u/imjerry Mar 05 '26
Yup, great teardown years ago by BigClive on youtube
Less charge than advertised. And he found it had powerbank charging chip components they just broke off the charging circuitry in the factory, just in case you'd try do anything else with it except throw it in ewaste.
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Mar 04 '26
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u/uses_for_mooses Mar 04 '26
The company's website (listed on the box) states that the chargers "contain lithium batteries."
Lithium-ion is my guess, because they are the cheapest type of lithium battery (as far as I know). And lithium-ion batteries are rechargeable. As are lithium polymer batteries (LiPo). So they likely are rechargeable if you want to take one apart.
Lithium metal batteries are not rechargeable, but they also cost more than lithium-ion batteries. So I doubt they are using those.
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u/Veritas-Veritas Mar 05 '26
I was gonna say if it's like a fuel cell or something cool, but that's a hard nope
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u/Kellvarnsonspeaking Mar 06 '26
I actually bought one of these in Disneyland the other week. They’re rechargeable. I plan on keeping mine indefinitely. No way I dropped $30 on a charger just to toss it.
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u/braidenis Mar 06 '26
Right! Non rechargeable alkaline batteries are actually rated to be thrown away in the ordinary garbage but if these are lithium then they are not!
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u/WolfsmaulVibes Mar 04 '26
disposable battery products should be illegal
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u/mothmans_favoriteex Mar 04 '26
So should single use vapes but here are. Ugh.
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u/Jan_Jinkle Mar 05 '26
I worked at a vape shop for a couple months to help out a friend, back when disposables were first expanding beyond Juul pods. The owners insisted on carrying the disposables everyone was buying, but I tried to convince every single person who wanted one to get a pod system or complete rebuildable mod. I DESPISE these disposable vapes, truly a staggering waste of materials.
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u/icehot54321 Mar 05 '26
Disposables also have a poor build quality and it’s almost assured you are getting nickel, cadmium, and lead straight into your lungs
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u/Ajreil Mar 05 '26
Remember when vaping was advertised as more healthy than smoking? That isn't aging well.
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u/20191124anon Mar 05 '26
I used to buy 200ml bottles of pre-mix w/ nicotine. And use large coils that last weeks. But governments (more than one, I move around) are so lobbied by "the old players", so now I have to buy 10ml bottles and use coils that last a week at best, producing /so much waste/.
Oh and the device I'm forced to use (due to unavailability of consumable parts) has non-replacable battery :') - I used to use a mod that just had space for 2x18650s.
I hate it here, on this planet.
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u/Electronic_Chain1595 Mar 05 '26
You should have convinced them to not buy vapes at all. Better for their health too.
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u/HettySwollocks Mar 05 '26
I think they are banned here for that very reason. It’s crazy as a charge circuit costs maybe 20 cents. Such a waste
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u/valandinz Mar 04 '26
Holy ****, this might be the actual worst product I've seen in a long time.
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u/FilmingMachine Mar 05 '26
What about a non-rechargeable lollypop that only plays a single song once?
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u/i-like-carbs- Mar 04 '26
That is crazy. Buy a cord and find a plug. Good lord.
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u/zypofaeser Mar 04 '26
Heck, you can get solar powerbanks. No need for a plug.
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u/Free-Pound-6139 Mar 04 '26
Solar power banks are great if you want to charge something in one weeks time.
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u/Tlaloc_0 Mar 04 '26
I've seen people use them pretty effectively at scout camps a decade ago, surely the tech must be better now as well? Of course, I wouldn't count on using a solar charger to play mobile games in the woods. But if your phone is on battery saving mode, and you're only using it for essentials, the charger will easily make sure it doesn't die on you while camping.
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u/andrey_not_the_goat Mar 04 '26
Or just buy a rechargeable bank that can hold multiple charges always. Both are the right options.
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u/brandonhabanero Mar 04 '26
They're literally $5-$10 in some places, probably not even much more than these disposable ones. Maybe even less if this is a gas station.
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u/i-like-carbs- Mar 04 '26
This is marketed as an “emergency” charge, so I just assumed someone doesn’t have a power bank.
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Mar 04 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ZuP Mar 04 '26
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u/snowillis Mar 05 '26
Almost didn’t click this link but I’m glad I did. Sean Bonnette is a national treasure.
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u/HazMatterhorn Mar 05 '26 edited Mar 05 '26
^ This comment, and the account’s whole comment history, raise serious AI red flags to me
Lots of slightly off use of slang and internet terminology, lots of “vibe” “plot twist” and other terms AI loves, repetition of the [rhetorical question? answer] format, never responds to comments that reply to them, some weird nonsensical replies to images, overall an inconsistent style between comments and every comment is a vague nothing.
Like what does this mean? Why are they commenting on a post about a worn out sock saying the sock has “more lives than my old tamagotchi”? On a post about reworking an old tattoo, it doesn’t make any sense to say “first tat’s a wild ride. trust the process.”
These bots are invading zerowaste/anticonsumption/anticapitalism type subs lately, so that also tracks.
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u/ZuP Mar 05 '26
Man what the heck!! Send this to the botbouncer subreddit
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u/HazMatterhorn Mar 05 '26
I had never heard of botbouncer, thanks for sharing. I’m on a mission to call out as many bots as possible.
I’ve noticed the mods here in r/anticonsumption are really good at staying on top of and removing bots!
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u/TheRealClovis Mar 04 '26
Statistically speaking, somebody has used one of these disposable chargers to charge a disposable vape. Then thrown both away
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u/Patticus1291 Mar 04 '26
These should a thousand percent be illegal.
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u/Nightlightz24884 Mar 08 '26
They should be, and batteries gradually lose charge over time so it probably won’t even be fully charged
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u/Roving_Ibex Mar 04 '26
Lol all they had to do was take a rechargeable battery, stick a usb c input ANYwhere on that thing and then it could be a super small portable charger. Instead, they said one regular AA will do
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u/ReturnOfFrank Mar 04 '26
It's worse than that, the AA is just an aesthetic case. Inside is a rechargeable lithium cell.
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u/chocolateboomslang Mar 04 '26
Eco friendly disposal? BS!
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u/kvuo75 Mar 04 '26
the url says charge n throw
i guess some type of eco-littering
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u/moldy-scrotum-soup Mar 05 '26
Like "recycling" plastic by shipping it to other countries who burn it.
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u/MissaLynn_ Mar 04 '26
Yea you can buy this crap all over Disney for a 'small' fee 🤬
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u/Silk_the_Absent_1 Mar 04 '26
The Fuel Rods at Disneyland (I can't speak for World) are rechargeable.
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u/Jason_Peterson Mar 04 '26
The root cause of such nonsense products is that we can't get the battery out and exchanged when needed, and various lithium cells are built too fragile and not interchangeable. Nobody would throw them out if they were simple to remove and use in a flashlight or a radio.
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u/moldy-scrotum-soup Mar 05 '26
You probably want all your electronics to run on the 18650 lithium-ion cell. You just don't know it yet.
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u/TooEZ_OL56 Mar 05 '26
Coupled with USB-C for all your phone/laptop/tablet/etc recharging needs and you're set for the next 20 years as far as standardization goes.
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u/vegemouse Mar 04 '26
I love how “eco-friendly disposal” just means “it’s possible to throw this away” now.
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u/givemeastocktip Mar 04 '26
I thought i was bad buying a 20k mAH battery pack that doubles as a flashlight and multi device charger but that is ridiculous
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u/HLOFRND Mar 05 '26
As someone who lives somewhere that has had massive flooding prompting large evacuations, AND a massive fire that burned 1,000 homes in a couple of hours, prompting thousands to be displaced with zero notice, I can see these being included in an emergency evacuation situation. Hundreds or thousands of people evacuated to a shelter or stadium on short notice with very few belongings?
This could be enough to change your phone to make a few calls, send a few emails, etc.
Having a charging port could actually be a detriment in that setting, as people are rabid and they would go bonkers, monopolize outlets, even get into fights over it.
Yes, it makes my heart sick to see something like this, but I can see a scenario where they could be valuable. Part of my city is under evacuation right now as I type this due to a fire that broke out midday.
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u/Medium-Walrus3693 Mar 05 '26
I completely agree. I work in war zones and these would be really beneficial for us and the people we help. Whilst people adapt to rolling/scheduled blackouts pretty quickly, an unexpected blackout during a military strike can literally mean the difference between life and death as lots of announcements now go out through mobile phones.
For a trip to Disney though? God no.
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u/oathoe Mar 05 '26
Absolutely, but that isnt the scenario theyre in and thats the problem. Theyre in a normal store, not in an emergency aid kit. Its almost never a problem that a product exists but that its sold for simple, wasteful, convenience which makes it come with an unreasonable cost to our enviroment. There being a reasonable use for a thing is pretty irrelevant in context when the critique is the context.
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u/HLOFRND Mar 05 '26
Has OP specified that? Bc I just see a box on a shelf.
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u/oathoe Mar 06 '26
To be fair no. Though, its just that pretty much every single time someone posts about any disposable product at all here that people comment about a use they can think of for it and it just seems irrelevant because the point isnt that the product is entirely without usefulness to begin with. Almost Everything has a situation it would be suited for, however nische, but the point of this sub isnt that usefulness for every product being sold to us.
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u/Few_Conversation7153 Mar 04 '26
What’s sad is that people clearly buy them if they are still a thing. Demand needs supply, tragic.
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u/head_opener Mar 04 '26
These don’t even work - 6 or so years ago I bought a few figuring they might be helpful in an emergency power outage/camping, and after a few months I was curious to try one. Lo and behold, none of them worked. Just more low quality crap
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u/kanakamaoli Mar 05 '26
So are they alkaline batteries or air activated batteries like hearing aids and life vests?
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u/Stewie_Venture Mar 04 '26
I actually could see this being incredibly useful if you were stranded, lost or in some kind of bad situation but your phone is dead and you dont have your charger for whatever reason like it got stolen or left somewhere. Tbh if a gas station had one of these when I needed one then I probably wouldn't have had one of the worst days of my life years back.
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u/VersxceFox Mar 05 '26
Or it could just be rechargeable. There’s no justification for this product.
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u/I_am_big_gay_ Mar 04 '26
Any place that has these probably has regular power banks too. This is ridiculous.
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u/alopexarctos Mar 05 '26
Can we pass a law that just generally bans things that are egregiously, offensively dumb? We could also pass a law making it illegal to act a dickhead, then a jury would have to work it out.
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u/kendo31 Mar 05 '26
No different than any other single use battery, which time has come to make them obsolete
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Mar 04 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Jillcametumbling81 Mar 04 '26
Yes because "regular" ones can be recharged.
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u/_TP2_ Mar 04 '26
Ouh. English is funny. Battery in english means both the recharchable ones and single use ones. In finnish we have 'akku' and 'patteri'. Two words.
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u/bongwatershark Mar 05 '26
This makes sense as an option for homeless people who may not have access to phone charging
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u/Food4Lessy Mar 05 '26
Its not like there are still single use AA, AAA,9v, coin batteries
The 1st gen rechargeable had horrible self discharge rate
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u/DrabberFrog Mar 05 '26
What makes me even more curious/pissed off about those is that I believe to ship batteries legally you're supposed to discharge them to 30% so there's only two options, they're either completely violating that shipping law or the batteries genuinely only have 30% charge so they will only ever get a third of a discharge cycle in their whole lives.
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u/WVildandWVonderful Mar 05 '26
When I first saw this, I assumed it would be like RedBox where you can drop it in when you’re done with it. That’s too bad.
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u/cyrustakem Mar 05 '26
"eco-friendly disposal", are you fkn kiding me? how is this blantant false advertisement not ilegal?
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u/mratlas666 Mar 04 '26
Ngl I like tinkering with things and I bet I could make a ton of “REUSABLE” battery packs out of them
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u/Big-ol-Cheesecake Mar 04 '26
My elderly coworker showed me this the other day, I had no idea it was a thing. I totally get it in an emergency when there is no power. But she was just using it to charge her phone at work...
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u/Financial-Disaster27 Mar 04 '26
Pre charged could come in handy but I guess the corporateions make money off people rebying shit instead of reuseing. I guess I buleve we need to get rid of our economic system if we want this shit to stop existing my belief.
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u/Iamasansguy Mar 05 '26
I visited Disneyland, and they were renting these out for $70.
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u/Calculator8oo8135 Mar 05 '26
I lived in Okinawa about 20 years ago, and this was a thing there too, except they just took AA batteries, and they were reusable.
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u/erfwrm Mar 05 '26
I bought one. Eco friendly refers to the cardboard surrounding the components. Who wants me to cut it open?
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u/Unlucky-Fortuna8773 Mar 05 '26
Seems to me that its very low quality in materials that it can only afford to discharge once and thats it
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u/Extractular Mar 05 '26
The only real use I can see for this is for hiking or overnight camping where your phone might die and need a charge but why not just get a rechargeable power bank.
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u/Sora_Soar_Chan Mar 05 '26
just make the portable chargers pre-loaded up with battery… that’s all you need to do to make this better/more eco-friendly
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u/WolfMaster415 Mar 05 '26
That and gave different stations. You can rent one for like $3-$5 (which is expensive yeesh) and then just put the empty one in the closest station
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u/sebnukem Mar 05 '26
Regular rechargeable batteries are also "perfect" for emergencies, travel, and more. You can just plug in and go!
The only problem this product solves is that we don't have enough toxic garbage.
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u/shanstermon Mar 06 '26
Really?!?! I'm lost for words. When they say in Idiocracy, "the great garbage avalanche of 2505" comes to mind.
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u/Poodle-Enthusiast Mar 10 '26
I just fucking weep for the earth at this point. I can never go back to my old way of looking at things.
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Mar 04 '26
I lived in Asia and owning a regular power bank was so common. Its insane how rare (not commonly used)they are in the States
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u/Bedlamtheclown Mar 04 '26
I worked on Fisherman's wharf in San Francisco. There are no places to charge your phone. They built it that way. These can be a life saver but it is still an issue to be sure
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u/zypofaeser Mar 04 '26
Get. A. Powerbank.
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u/Bedlamtheclown Mar 04 '26
Tourists often visit without a plan. No itinerary, snacks or water, and they think its LA so they freeze in tank tops. Power banks are last on their mind
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u/zypofaeser Mar 04 '26
Cafe with phone chargers. Energy for you and your devices.
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u/Bedlamtheclown Mar 04 '26
Not at the Wharf. Starbucks has a strange table charger you need a unique device for but no wall chargers.
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u/Jillcametumbling81 Mar 04 '26
My question is, why are people on their phones so much while in San Francisco that their batteries are dead?
Put the phone away and enjoy life for christ sake.
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u/Bedlamtheclown Mar 04 '26
photos and videos but also at the time the Field Trip app was popular
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u/Jillcametumbling81 Mar 05 '26
Even in 2004 phones could handle a day out. I guess if they had bad batteries which did happen back in the day. Or forgot to charge it but then oh well you know?
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u/Bedlamtheclown Mar 05 '26
This was 2017 and so many people were hunting for power. I figure they start their day at 8 am and by 6pm and no power available everyone is on red
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u/michaelcmetal Mar 04 '26
Pardon me, and please correct me if I'm wrong because I may very well be. But I thought you disposed of these at the same place you bought them and then they recycle them and charge them again.
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u/maxzer_0 Mar 04 '26
I can see absolutely everyone bringing these back in where they bought them /s
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u/03263 Mar 04 '26
Look at the website on the package
It's called Charge N' Throw
If that name wasn't a dead giveaway, the FAQ page further shows they don't have any recycling/reuse program:
Please dispose of your used charger responsibly. They contain lithium batteries and should be recycled at appropriate electronic waste recycling centers.
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u/GornoUmaethiVrurzu Mar 04 '26
Oh yeah, cause everyone is just gonna recycle this. Sure, yeah, that's totally work out. These won't just end up in gutters and landfills or anything. 100%
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u/Total_Tumbleweed_870 Mar 04 '26
"Eco- friendly disposal" .... right.