The days of emailing the whole office to ask if anyone has a mobile-phone charger that fits your phone are numbered, as European standardisation bodies on Wednesday released harmonised standards for a common charger.

The move is the latest in the European Union's plans to introduce a global common mobile-phone charger, sparing business travellers in particular the frustration of being unable to find a suitable charger as their phone battery runs out.

The European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC) and the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) have released the standards for interoperability needed for the manufacture of data-enabled mobile phones compatible with a new common charger. The compatibility will be on the basis of Micro-USB connectors. The new standards take into account safety risks and electro-magnetic emissions and ensure that common chargers have sufficient immunity to external interference.

As well as inconvenience for consumers, incompatibility of chargers is also a considerable environmental problem as users who change their mobile phones must usually acquire a new charger and dispose of the old one.

"Now it is time for industry to show its commitment to sell mobile phones for the new charger. The common charger will make life easier for consumers, reduce waste and benefit businesses. It is a true win-win situation," said Industry Commissioner Antonio Tajani.

In 2009, 14 leading mobile-phone producers - Apple, Emblaze Mobile, Huawei Technologies, LGE, Motorola Mobility, NEC, Nokia, Qualcomm, Research In Motion (RIM), Samsung, Sony Ericsson, TCT Mobile (ALCATEL), Texas Instruments and Atmel - agreed to work toward harmonisation for chargers for data-enabled mobile phones.

The European Commission expects the first common chargers and mobile phones compatible with the new standards to reach the European market in early 2011.

http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/index.c ... ID=3254759

While I agree with the idea in principle, what happens with the apple dock? There are so many docking stations around. Or will they have to have a separate charging port?

Forget it, I'm being thick, they'll supply an adapter.

Quite so, the regulations as published specifically allow for adapters to be considered a viable solution. Back in the day when I bought one of the original iPods, I bought a small dongle which had a dock connector on one end and a firewire socket on the other, because iPod cables were bloody difficult to get hold of. Cost me about a fiver I think. I'm sure Apple could get the micro USB equivalent made for pence per ipod/iphone.

Jon

Yes that is the simplest option. Imagine getting a £400 Zeppelin iPod speaker and finding the new iPhone does not fit!

Actually Apple have been perfectly happy to change iPods so lots of things don't work with the 'new models' on more than one occasion anyway...

Jon