Community Battery Collection
Australians consume 345 million small handheld batteries per year. This is a lot of batteries and most end up in landfill with only about 4% being recycled. The dry cell battery recycling program, funded by the Waste Authority and supported by WA Local Government including the Mindarie Regional Council, is all about trying to change this and through this program Western Australia is now the largest recycler of dry cell batteries in Australia.
Why the recycling of dry cell batteries is important
As useful as batteries are they unfortunately can contain toxic substances which may be harmful if released into the environment. They also contain valuable metals that can be recycled.
Batteries should not to be disposed of in the general household rubbish green lid bin. Batteries placed in these bins may end up at a composting facility and cause contamination. Plus if they make their way into bins or into landfill residual charge in the batteries can spark fires, another problem. They also won’t be recycled if they go into the yellow top recycling bin as the processes at these recycling plants don’t recycle items like batteries.
So how and where can you dispose of batteries?
Community battery collection bins can be found throughout the Perth metro area, often in libraries and shopping centres. Please click here for a list of these drop off locations.
Last Updated: 27 Feb 2020