Green Gadgets Aim to Woo Eco-Aware Shoppers

LONDON (Reuters) -Gadget makers showed off their green credentials at a technology showin London on Friday to try to tempt consumers worried about soaringfuel bills, climate change and the financial crisis.

Amid the usual array of power-hungry televisions, stereos andcomputers, a handful of companies promoted high tech products designedto cut energy consumption.

London-based firm DIY Kyoto has come up with the Wattson, a wirelessdevice that lets families monitor exactly how much power they are usingat home.

It measures electricity consumption and displays the amount of powerand how much it costs on a sleek portable box with a digital screen.

The device, which costs 100 pounds, glows red when households usemore power than normal or blue when they are being energy efficient.

"The whole idea is to save money and to save the environment," JasonGoldman, of DIY Kyoto, told Reuters at the Stuff Live! show. "You findpeople try to get the reading down as low as possible."

British gadget Web site www.firebox.com displayed a Chinese-built electric scooter that it has converted for sale on the British market.

Called the Ego Street Scoota, it has a 30 to 40-mile range and a topspeed of 30 mph. It costs eight pence to charge the bike using themains electricity supply.

Parked next to it was a more powerful scooter from U.S. firmVectrix. Its Maxi-Scooter has a top speed of 62 mph and a range of 68miles at 25 mph. Its latest model has a built-in music player and asystem that sends music wirelessly to your helmet.

While nearly all the gadgets on display rely on electricity orbatteries, a range of portable chargers from U.S. company Solio usessolar power.

Its device can convert one hour of sunshine into an hour of playback on an iPod or 25 minutes of talk time on a mobile.

The gadget has three blades which fan out to catch sunlight which it then stores in an internal battery for up to a year.

Wearing its heart on its sleeve, one energy-efficient laptop camewith a shell made of bamboo instead of the usual plastic or metal in anattempt to reinforce its eco-friendly aspirations.

Taiwanese computer maker Asustek said it used bamboo because it isstrong, grows back quickly and is biodegradable. One blogger quipped:"Don’t let your panda near it."

(Editing by Astrid Zweynert and Paul Casciato)