Where can you recycle batteries? Ecosurety adds 1,600 recycling points to WRAP map

Compliance specialist Ecosurety has added more than 1,600 battery collection points to Recycle Now’s online Recycling Locator tool.

The Recycling Locator tool provides information on local recycling and reuse facilities, plus information on what can and cannot be recycled at home. The additional battery drop-off locations added by Ecosurety have been provided by some of Ecosurety’s largest members, plus collection partners like Currys PC World.

It is hoped that the additional locations will make it easier to recycle unwanted waste batteries and help push up the UK’s battery recycling rate, having fallen just short of the 45 per cent target for battery collections in 2016.

Many retailers are required by law to provide provisions for free battery takeback, if they sell or supply more than 32kg of consumer batteries a year - equivalent to four AA batteries a day.

Batteries must be recycled separately as when collected alongside other recyclables in a kerbside bin they can present a risk due to the chemicals within that can ignite. In Northamptonshire earlier this year, an explosion in the back of a recycling collection vehicle was caused by rechargeable batteries, and the resulting fire meant that much of the load within the vehicle had to be dumped.

Ecosurety has been active in encouraging the UK public to recycle their unwanted batteries, an estimated 20,000 tonnes of which remain hidden away in drawers around the country and will eventually find their way to landfill.

In October, Ecosurety launched its Bring Back Heavy Metal campaign with behaviour change specialist Hubbub to encourage people to recycle their waste batteries, while it is also in the process of developing the UK’s first battery recycling plant with recycling solutions firm Belmont Trading UK at Belmont’s site near Glasgow, which will have a capacity of taking 20,000 tonnes of waste batteries a year.

Commenting on the announcement, Robbie Staniforth, Commercial Manager at Ecosurety, and one of the instigators of the plan to add additional recycle points, said: “Ecosurety is pleased to help strengthen the UK’s battery recycling infrastructure. There are so many locations that now accept batteries, but consumers need to be aware where they can easily take their discarded batteries, especially if they are concerned about how to dispose of them correctly themselves.”

Linda Crichton, Head of Recycle Now, added: “Our ambition with the Recycling Locator is to make it easier for everyone to know where they can recycle any item in their area; and by adding more than 1,600 battery recycling locations to the Locator, Ecosurety is helping us to achieve that goal – ultimately reducing the number of batteries going for disposal.”

You can read more about Ecosurety’s new battery recycling plant in an article by Paul Timmins, Operations Director at Ecosurety, for Resource 90. 

WRAP's Recycling Locator tool, which can guide you to your nearest recycling points for a number of materials or tell you what you can put in your bin, can be found on the WRAP website.