Solar energy is nothing but the energy harnessed from sunlight which is available in abundant and just needs to be tapped with appropriate devices. Solar Charger, is not a new product and there are already many solar chargers available in the market which are really great; however the main problem with even the best of the chargers is that either they are too heavy or too big which makes it difficult to be carried around during day to day activities. Some of them even take a very long time to charge the gadgets. The major goal behind developing ‘Solar Paper’ was to get a small scale personal solar charger which could charge the gadgets much faster. Thus, a company known as YOLK, a solar charger startup based in the US, successfully developed ‘Solar Paper’ which claims to be the world’s first thinnest and lightest solar charger. Yolk is the same company which had developed the Solarade portable chargers last year which had an awesome response and a positive review. Solar Paper is just the size of an iPhone 6 measuring around 19 cm in length and 9 cm in width, and it seems that the charger is able to charge an iPhone 6 in mere 2.5 hours in full sun, which is really amazing because most of the other solar chargers and even a wall charger would take almost double this time to charge an iPhone6. The Solar Paper is extremely thin, about 1.5 millimeters thick along the length of the panel, and the company claims that the charger is so thin that it can be even placed in between the pages of a notebook and used as a bookmark. On the other hand, it weighs around 120 grams indicating it is light in weight. The top end of the panel features a USB port that can connect to the gadgets and a LCD screen which displays the overall current charge being passed from the panel to the gadget. This LCD screen would help the user to make out how much energy is being generated by the charger and also user can study how the charger is performing in different atmospheres. Due to the LCD screen this portion of the panel is a bit thicker measuring around 1.1 centimeters; however otherwise the device is pretty slim. This light weight and thin solar charger can even be draped around the exterior of a backpack thus helping the hikers to gather adequate sun rays and then use this solar energy to charge their gadgets. Each single unit of the Solar Paper outputs around 2.5 Watts. Besides, the beauty of the product is that the panels have been embedded with magnets which enables users to link together the extra panels depending upon the requirement of their charging. Users can have the Solar Paper charging configured in the multiples of 2.5 W such as 2.5 W, 5 W, 7.5 W and 10 W. One would thus need four panels so as to get 10 W, which is the power required to charge a tablet. The magnetic surfaces also help users to stick them on some metallic surfaces while placing it outdoors. Solar Paper charger is currently on the global crowd funding platform, Kickstarter and the good news is that it has already surpassed its goal of $50,000 and at the time of writing this article it has crossed $214,415, while the company still has 36 days more to go. Once the funding rounds comes to an end the company would focus on developing their first batch of Solar Paper and it is expected that the first batch of chargers would be shipped to customers in September this year. The Solar Paper can be used to charge GoPro, external battery, Bluetooth speaker, Digital camera, double recharging battery charger, flashlight, smartphone and even Tablet just by adding additional panels. If readers are looking for a super thin solar chargers then they would need to churn out around $69, now, for a basic two panel version that gives a 5W output. For the 7.5 W and 10 W the cost might be a bit more. The retail price would increase after the Kickstarter campaign and is expected to hit $120. Check the below video:
