Dear “Earth Talk”: I’ve heard that
it is now safe to throw away common household batteries and that only
rechargeable batteries can now be recycled. Is this true? — Doug
Reynolds, Martinsville, Ind.
Today’s common household batteries —
those ubiquitous AA’s, AAA’s, C’s, D’s and 9-volts
from Duracell, Energizer, and others — are not thought to pose as
great a threat to properly equipped modern landfills as they used to
because they contain much less mercury than their predecessors did. For
this reason, most municipalities now recommend simply throwing such
batteries away with your trash. Nevertheless, environmentally concerned consumers
might feel better recycling such batteries anyway because they still do
contain trace amounts of mercury and other potentially toxic stuff. Some
municipalities will accept these batteries (as well as older, more toxic
ones) at household-hazardous-waste facilities, from where they will most
likely be sent elsewhere to be processed and recycled as components in new
batteries. Other options — such as the mail-order service
Battery Solutions, which will recycle your spent batteries at a cost of 85
cents per pound — abound. To find a company near you where you can
drop off your old batteries for recycling, check out the comprehensive
national database at the Earth911.org Web site. Meanwhile, the national
chain Batteries Plus is happy to take back disposable batteries for
recycling at any of its 255 retail stores from coast to coast. Consumers should note that any old batteries they may
find buried in their closets that were made before 1997 — when
Congress mandated a widespread mercury phase-out in batteries of all types
— should most surely be recycled and not discarded with the trash
because they may contain as much as 10 times the mercury of newer versions. Perhaps of greater concern nowadays is what’s
happening to spent rechargeable batteries from cell phones, MP3 players and
laptops. Such items contain potentially toxic heavy metals sealed up inside
and, if thrown out with the regular garbage, can jeopardize the
environmental integrity of both landfills and incinerator emissions.
Luckily, the battery industry sponsors the operations of the Rechargeable
Battery Recycling Corp., which facilitates the collection of used
rechargeable batteries in an industry-wide “take back” program
for recycling. Consumers can help by limiting their electronics
purchases to items that carry the RBRC logo on their packaging.
Furthermore, you can find out where to drop off old rechargeable batteries
(and even old cell phones) by calling RBRC’s hotline, 800-8BATTERY or
visiting the online drop-location finder at www.rbrc.org. Also, most Radio
Shack stores will take back rechargeable batteries and deliver them to RBRC
free of charge. RBRC then processes the batteries by means of a thermal
recovery technology that reclaims metals such as nickel, iron, cadmium,
lead, and cobalt, repurposing them for use in new batteries.
For more information: Battery Solutions, www.batteryrecycling.com; Earth911,
www.earth911.org; Batteries Plus, www.batteriesplus.com; Rechargeable
Battery Recycling Corp., www.rbrc.org.
Send questions to “Earth Talk” in care of
E/The Environmental Magazine, P.O. Box 5098, Westport, CT 06881; or e-mail
earthtalk@emagazine.com.
This article appears in May 11-17, 2006.
