EU Proposing Mandatory Battery Recycling

Ironsides writes "The BBC Reports that the European Union is working on a directive to mandate battery recycling. Among other things, it will ban more than trace amounts of cadmium and mercury and require all batteries to be removeable. If it passes, it will be interesting to see how this affects such devices as MP3 players that generally do not have removeable rechargeable batteries."

Comments

Very brave

[MightyYar]

How very bold of the politicians to remove mercury from batteries now that the packaging on most batteries advertises "Mercury Free!". And getting rid of cadmium is a risky political move now that every device worth it's salt uses Lithium-Ion technology! Bold, bold moves from truly noble men and women.

What about lemons?

[Killshot]

Will they recycle lemon batteries?

Removable?

[cgenman]

Any battery is removable.

Convenience

[Tablizer]

If there was a convenient way to dispose of "technological waste" such as batteries and computers, then most would not mind.

However, if you have to call around to chase a moving target to turn risky garbage in, most will just dump it in the regular garbage.

The trash pickup company could have a policy whereby tech waste is put in say blue bags by the side of the curb with the rest of the trash one day of the month. A small tax on semi-hazardous tech devices could pay for it. Or perhaps regular bags with a pre-determined message/sign taped to it.

Re:Convenience

[houghi]

Welcome to the world. I live in Belgium. and all is already available and done.

Convenient way to dispose of "technological waste" such as batteries. Check. Many stores and even offices have a box where you can put your empty batteries that are then dealth with in a convinient way. That way you do not have to handle each and every batter single and on your own.

Tech waste is put in say blue bags. Check. There are several different types of wastebags for different kinds of wast. Larger items, like PC's can be brought back to the store who then handles it further.

A small tax on semi-hazardous tech devices. Check. It is called eco-tax.

Regular bags with a pre-determined message/sign. Check. See above. Different kinds of waste have different kinds of bags.

Won't change much in appearance

[_merlin]

All that's going to happen is the manufacturers will provide a facility for you to return the device so they can remove the battery. I don't think the bill says batteries have to be user-removable, just removable.

This could potentially affect things like real-time clock chips, though. You'd either have to make the whole chip removable, or use an external battery. "Suicide batteries" in arcade game cartridges could also come under this.

As for banning cadmium - how will cordless power tools go? NiCd still performs better than NiMH or LiIon for high-current applications.

Re:Unintended consequences

[evilviper]

After this, people will chuck their cell phones into the nearest river, even more directly polluting the environment they tried to protect.

Now WHY would someone do that? Out of spite for the new law? No, I think not.

This requires shops to collect used batteries at NO COST, so I can't see any reason someone would do something as insane as going out of their way to toss it into a river.

Already been done for years in Germany

[PontifexPrimus]

In Germany we had the Batterieverordnung since 1998, and it hasn't had the catastrophic consequences most people in this thread imagine. It just means you can't toss old batteries in the trash (and yes, they do check occasionally) but have to take them back to any store where batteries are sold (not just electronics stores) and dump 'em into the recycling containers conveniently displayed at the entrance of the store. In the case of non-removable batteries you have to turn in your whole device and hand it in at any electronics shop. I really don't see where the problem is with that, and why it should be so much better than the American way of just putting all kinds of garbage in a bag, burying it in a landfill and then forgetting about it until the cancer rates go up.