Batteries

Household Batteries

Battery disposal tubes are located outside the Porters' Office or at Reception in the following locations:
  • Administration Building, Level 2
  • Ashby Building
  • Geography, Elmwood Building
  • Medical Biological Centre (MBC)
  • David Keir building (DKB)
  • Health Sciences Building
  • McClay Library
Battery types        
Batteries which can be disposed of in these tubes include the smaller ‘household’/ consumer batteries such as non-chargeable (general purpose and button cells) and rechargeable (nickel cadmium, lithium ion and smaller lead acid).

Larger industrial type batteries, such as lead acid car type batteries and nickel cadmium batteries used in emergency standby systems, should be disposed of by contacting your School/ Directorate’s Building Liaison Officer (BLO) with details of the batteries for disposal.  The BLO then places an online works request for internal collection by the Estates Directorate.

Why recycle batteries?
Recycling batteries is important for a number of reasons. Batteries can contain chemicals such as lead, mercury or cadmium. When you dispose of them with your normal rubbish, most will end up in landfill where the chemicals they contain may leak into the ground. This can pollute the soil and water and potentially harm human health.

Recycling also recovers some of the materials used to make batteries and these can be used again to make other products and potentially to make new batteries. Recycling can also save some of the earth’s natural resources and save on CO2 emissions by reducing the need to mine new materials.

In the UK we currently recycle 3% of old batteries. The government intention is to increase the battery recycling rate to 45% in the next 5 years (i.e. by 2016).

Battery facts and figures
  • Around 600 million UK household batteries (22,000 tonnes) – the equivalent weight of 110 jumbo Jets – are sent to landfill unnecessarily every year
  • The average household uses 21 batteries a year, all of which could be recycled.

For further information on battery recycling, go to WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme) website.