Residents of Hertfordshire are being encouraged to begin dropping off redundant batteries at specific drop-off points as a means of boosting recycle efforts for battery waste. The scheme, scheduled to begin sometime this month, will require battery disposal to be handled at specific drop-off bins by all residents.
Hertfordshire County Council approved the scheme after a study released the figures that only three percent of all batteries across the UK were being re-used. Executive member for waste, as well as the chairman of the Hertfordshire Waste Partnership, Derrick Ashley stated that batteries are comprised of important chemicals and materials such as zinc, lithium, and lead which are easily recycled for reuse in other products.
Currently over 600 million batteries are sent to UK landfills every year. It is a huge waste of material resources to be ending up in landfills when they could be recycled to generate new products, adds Mr Ashley. Residents of Hertfordshire will now be encouraged and urged to recycle their used batteries a consistent basis to help cut down on this misuse of resources.
Part of the new programme will see that any large shops which sell batteries will now have specified bins for recycling of them properly. Additionally, the scheme will require community volunteers to oversee battery collection boxes placed around town.
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