Environmental responsibility...

... is something that I try and keep in mind, be it turning off power when not required, or taking my bag to buy groceries. I am a vegetarian and I don't typically over eat or waste food. With all this, one thing that I couldn't get myself to do was to spend on recyclable batteries in India.

I have a duracell charger and recyclable batteries that I use for my mouse and keyboard combo when I am on the move. Unfortunately owing to the various voltages across the world and frequency of the Alternating Current (AC), they can’t be used anywhere else other than US. I had a rechargeable rig before heading to US. However, it’s in Chennai and I don’t have access to it.

I went to Staples today and was checking out the various options available for me today, and realized that the recyclable batteries are sold at about 8x the price of normal batteries and the charging rig costs about 15 times an average pair of AA batteries. And this comes at a lower Wh rating. That implies that I need to recharge more often than using the throwaway batteries.

Economics prevailed and I ended up buying an 8pack of disposable batteries. I shall do the needful and dispose of them properly =|. However, the government should really look into this. With consumer spending on the rise and people flocking to buy TVs, flat panels, Home theater systems, etc the battery usage of an average family would be way superior to mine and hence economics would play an even bigger role there. We really need to find a way to bring technology that tries and makes living a little greener, cheaper. =|

On another note, check out this awesome wallpaper from Flickr.