Solar Gadgets Shine
In Blackout's Aftermath

Sept. 4, 2003 -- When the electricity went out Aug. 14, Stuart Chalem never lost his cool. Really. The Sunnyside, N.Y., homeowner just switched on his solar-powered fan and enjoyed the breeze. "The neighbors were so jealous," says Mr. Chalem, who has since picked up a solar battery charger as well to run his lights, radio and maybe even fridge the next time around.

Here comes the sun. Almost as soon as the lights went back on last week, a good number of Americans hit their phones and computers to order an array of solar-powered gadgets, from $80 laptop rechargers to sun ovens that can roast a chicken in a couple of hours. Retailers and makers across the country say sales jumped by as much as a third in the wake of the blackout. Indeed, at Innovative Technologies, a retailer of sun-powered devices, more than 2,000 Web orders poured in within days. "People always wait till after a disaster to be prepared," says Kevin Barnes, the Canadian company's president.

While sales of solar-powered gadgets have been climbing slowly for years, to an estimated $20 million annually, industry analysts say last week's events abruptly changed what's hot. Before the power outage, toys like garden fountains and "light catchers" were the big sellers. Now it's solar flashlights and cellphone chargers (they also can be used to power the kids' Game Boys) -- not to mention a $1,995 "emergency power kit" that can run even major appliances. The common thread: They all promise to keep folks comfortable and connected in a pinch. Still, some of the devices can seem over the top, like a sun-powered radio built into a visor (it's usually used by joggers) and a "mosquito guard" that hangs on a key ring (whatever happened to bug spray?).

Ready to Go

Alana and Bill Dubois of Robbinsville, N.J., added to their solar stash last week, after Mr. Dubois watched the charge on his cellphone ebb away while he was trying to make his way home from his Manhattan office during the blackout. "If we'd lost the connection, I'd have no idea where he was," says his wife, who was trying to keep track of him. Now they have a pair of $69 Solar e-Power Chargers for their phones. The gadgets' sun-catching panels fold up to about the size of laptop computers, so they can "grab them and go," should another crisis crop up.

Of course, it wasn't so long ago that Americans were being urged to pull together emergency kits filled with canned food, water and duct tape -- not devices to charge their laptops. But in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, people were more focused on keeping dangerous elements out, rather than ways to keep daily life powered up.

Now that's changed. And, as people are discovering, there's a whole array of gadgets capable of generating enough juice to run a fan, a television or a computer. Indeed, says John Schaeffer, president of Gaiam Real Goods, a Colorado retailer, the number of new solar devices has tripled in the last five years. The big innovators: Companies in places like Hong Kong and Japan, where high energy demand -- and soaring costs for fuels -- have spurred an explosion in new products.

Power for Days

And, unlike those old solar-powered calculators, these don't kick out every time a cloud passes by. Most are equipped with small batteries that can store the sun's energy, then continue to run for hours after dark. How long can they go? Mr. Schaeffer, who sells the emergency power kit, says it can keep water pumps, power tools and even home-entertainment systems running for as many as five days (though the batteries run an extra $399 each). But, just in case, many makers include hand-cranks, battery compartments or car adapters that'll keep the juice going when the solar power runs out.

A crank came in handy for Leonore Dunlop, whose $40 Solar Dynamo radio/flashlight fizzled after just a few hours last week. Even better: She had two young nephews on hand to do the turning (it takes about three minutes of work to get 30 minutes of power). And because the self-described "greenie" also had invested in solar garden lights, she was able to read into the night after everyone else was left in the dark -- she just brought them up onto the porch. "You couldn't make out the color pictures though," says the Seaford, N.Y., computer programmer, who has since picked up a solar lantern on the Web and is looking into solar-power sources for her air conditioning, television and ham radio, too.

And it's not just people in the blackout zone who've been stocking up on all the gadgetry. Linda Collins Smith and her husband, Charles, never even lost power last week -- they live in Danvers, Mass. But they still hurried out and picked up a new solar-powered cellphone charger last week, and that's in addition the sun-powered radio, flashlight and fan they already own. In fact, Mrs. Smith figures they've spent more than $400 on solar-powered devices in the past couple of years -- and only used them in one "emergency," when a squirrel fried their electrical lines. That doesn't really bother her: "These days, we constantly feel vulnerable. But these gadgets take the bite out of it," she says.

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