Jacob Hayler of the Environmental Services Association investigates the problems the recycling and waste management industry faces when dealing with the disposal of lithium-ion batteries.
Carelessly discarded batteries are responsible for at least one significant fire at a recycling and waste management facility in the United Kingdom every day.
Among the myriad chemistries and millions of batteries incorrectly thrown away each year, it is lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries that are most prone to starting serious fires, since they have a high energy density and are particularly volatile once damaged. This battery format is now ubiquitous and Li-ion batteries are found in an increasingly wide range of household devices – typically those that have embedded batteries re-charged via a wall plug or USB cable, such as computers, mobile phones and tablets, razors and electric toothbrushes, power tools, e-scooters, bluetooth headphones, and vape devices, to mention a few.
Unfortunately, the recycling and waste sector has fallen victim to the dangers Li-ion batteries pose at the end of their life, which is largely the product of batteries being discarded incorrectly, for which there are several root causes discussed later.
If a lithium-ion battery (or any battery for that matter) is thrown away with mixed recycling or general rubbish, instead of being recycled separately through dedicated battery or waste electrical services, it is highly likely to become damaged during the collection, sorting and treatment process. Indeed, the very first thing that’s likely to happen is that it’s compacted and crushed in the back of a refuse collection vehicle while being collected from the kerbside! If it survives this process, the battery will then likely be tipped in a reception hall, handled by shovel loaders and pass through a mechanised sorting process of trommels, screens, magnets, conveyors, and ballistic separators – all of which dramatically reduce its chances of emerging unscathed.
The Environmental Services Association (ESA) conducted an annual survey among its members to record the causes of fires occurring in recycling and waste management facilities (buildings only) from 2016 to 2020 and the data showed that, by 2020, lithium-ion batteries alone were responsible for nearly 40% of all recorded fires – rising from circa 25% in 2016 – which equates to nearly 300 separate incidents per year. The actual figures are likely much higher since the data only reflects where a Li-ion battery was known to be the cause.
Since then, research by Material Focus in 2022, based on a survey of local authorities, sought to determine an annual number of battery fire incidents occurring in both buildings and vehicles within the recycling and waste management sector. This data suggested more than 700 fires had been caused by batteries over the course of the year.
Additionally, in December 2023, research commissioned by local authority insurers, Zurich Municipal, based on Freedom of Information data, found that the number of refuse collection vehicles damaged by fires has increased by 62% over the last two years. This is undoubtedly a contributing factor to some local authorities reporting more than a 500% rise in insurance costs for waste operations since 2016.
Ultimately, this data reflects what our members are seeing on the ground. That serious battery-related fires are occurring regularly and ever-more frequently. Indeed, a quick Google search on the very day of writing this article produced contemporaneous media reports of a serious battery fire occurring in a refuse collection vehicle in Cosham, Hampshire.
To cite further examples, of which there are many to choose from, in late 2023 a waste transfer station in Reading operated by one of our members, FCC, was rendered out of service by a battery fire which caused £20,000 worth of damage in minutes, while a battery fire at SUEZ’s brand new Materials Recycling Facility (MRF) in Aberdeen in 2022 completely destroyed a facility worth £27 million.
In 2021, the ESA commissioned a research report by Eunomia, entitled Cutting Lithium-Ion Battery Fires in the Waste Industry, which concluded that the cost of battery-related fires to the sector was more than £150 million a year.
Given the exponential growth of risky items such as “disposable” vapes in the three years since the research was carried out, the risk, incidence rate, and associated costs are likely to be significantly higher. The situation is getting out of control and, without fundamental reform to mitigate and reverse this trend, the sector may find certain operations uninsurable in future.
What has caused this problem?
In part, the very nature of Li-ion batteries makes them prone to ignition when damaged or faulty, but we do not wish to demonise this battery format, which has enormous benefits in normal use.
The risk for our sector arises when batteries, and waste electronic and electrical (WEEE) devices containing batteries, are not recycled separately using dedicated services. Disposing of batteries and waste electricals in dedicated containers ensures that they are transported to specialist, authorised, treatment facilities that can safely dismantle and recycle them. Ultimately the greater proportion of batteries that enter the correct disposal routes correspondingly reduces the proportion, and subsequent risk, of batteries present in conventional waste management processes.
Unfortunately, separate local authority kerbside collection services for waste batteries and WEEE are not widely available and alternative drop-off containers are most commonly found only at Household Waste Recycling Centres (HWRCs) or large retail stores – requiring additional effort on the part of the consumer to use. However, in addition to the greater effort required to recycle batteries properly, many consumers simply do not appreciate the dangers and consequences of binning batteries, according to multiple studies. These factors combined are a recipe for the wrong behaviours.
According to the results of a national YouGov poll conducted for the ESA in May 2023, batteries are incorrectly discarded with rubbish or other recycling more than any other common hazardous or flammable item – such as cigarette lighters, aerosols, or fuel. In the survey, nearly a quarter of respondents admitted to having incorrectly disposed of waste batteries alongside other kerbside-collected waste at least once during the course of a year.
National polling and focus group research conducted by Env23 for the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management (CIWM) in 2023 suggested that up to 80% of consumers lack confidence about how to safely dispose of items containing batteries – with items such as power banks, electric toothbrushes, and children’s toys among those with the lowest confidence levels. The research found that vapes and electric toothbrushes were the products most frequently thrown in the bin, while portable alkaline batteries were, conversely, the battery most commonly recycled correctly using collection banks. This suggests that more work on consumer communications is required, but universal and convenient infrastructure is a vital pre-condition of effective communications.
Collection banks for batteries and WEEE are largely funded through the producer responsibility regulations, which require producers who place batteries and electrical items on the market to fund and meet recycling collection targets for those items. In order to discharge these obligations, the producers become members of a small number of compliance organisations who are responsible for procuring the necessary recycling evidence and ‘greasing the wheels’ of the market – in particular by supporting the delivery of collection infrastructure to ensure enough batteries are captured and processed through authorised treatment facilities. However, this system only incentivises the producers and their supply chain to implement recycling services sufficient to meet their obligations.
Furthermore, a loophole in the current regulations is currently undermining investment in battery recycling for all chemistries other than lead acid. To date, the producer compliance organisations can meet their weight-based targets by collecting heavy lead-acid car batteries, which means less infrastructure is available for other battery chemistries.
In 2021, only 3% of portable batteries placed on the market were reported as lead-acid yet, for every portable lead-acid battery placed on the market, approximately ten were recycled and approximately three-quarters of total portable battery recycling evidence was generated from lead-acid batteries alone.
Although the Environment Agency has recently issued updated guidance to address this issue, it currently lacks the funding to enforce the regulations on the ground. Consequently, there has effectively been no economic driver to collect, treat and recycle other battery chemistries, such as lithium-ion, alkaline, and nickel-cadmium (Ni-Cd).
What is the solution?
Firstly, our sector is doing all it can to mitigate the risk of serious battery fires and, in recent years, ESA members have invested millions in the latest fire detection and suppression systems. Additionally, the ESA is currently working on a pioneering project with Google and Appsbroker to use artificial intelligence (AI) to identify batteries, or devices containing batteries, at household recycling centres so they can be extracted from waste streams before they cause a fire, while other AI and computer vision systems are being deployed on conveyor processes by individual organisations.
However, while this emerging technology offers fantastic potential, it has its limitations and will not identify the millions of batteries hidden in general rubbish bags or mixed recycling crates at the point they are collected from the kerbside.
Clearly, these measures also only address the symptom and not the cause of the problem, which we believe must be tackled through reform of the producer responsibility regimes for both WEEE and batteries.
At the very least, the ESA would like to see a more ambitious, clearly-defined, producer responsibility regime in place that adequately incentivises the capture of batteries placed on the market in the UK, alongside greater enforcement to detect and deter those getting a free ride.
Once this is in place, it should help fund greater separate kerbside collection of batteries – making life easier for consumers – and effective communications to go alongside these services. Consideration could also be given to a deposit return scheme on batteries and WEEE containing batteries (with the deposit amount modulated to reflect the inherent value of the item and ensure adequate financial incentive).
Government has promised reform of the producer responsibility regimes for WEEE and batteries for many years now but, after much delay, finally published its intentions alongside a consultation over WEEE reform during the 2023 Christmas holidays – which is due to close on 7 March 2024.
The 2021 ESA/Eunomia report, Cutting Lithium-Ion Battery Fires in the Waste Industry, presents a range of potential policy options to address this issue and these will be considered as part of our response to consultation, although we still await an announcement on reforms to the battery producer regulations.
Until then, raising consumer awareness of both the dangers of carelessly discarded batteries, and of correct recycling options, is among the most proactive actions we can take.
The ESA launched its Take Charge campaign in October 2020 and coined the evocative term “zombie batteries” to describe batteries lurking in other waste. On launch, the campaign was not only covered by all major national news publications in the UK, but also picked up worldwide – appearing in the New York Post, Sydney Herald and even on Russian television. The campaign approach has since been replicated in Finland, the US, and New Zealand, serving to emphasise that the dangers of Li-ion batteries are not unique to the UK market.
However, media coverage is only a flash-in-the-pan and sustaining the level of consumer visibility necessary to affect long-term behaviour change is an expensive marathon across earned, owned, and paid communications channels, not a sprint.
We do know from various research initiatives though, that once consumers are made aware of the fire risks, they are more likely to adjust their behaviour, even if it means going out of their way to use the correct infrastructure. To date, national polling suggests that the Take Charge campaign has reached up to 15% of the UK population (people who can recall seeing it), which is a fantastic ROI for the campaign spend, but clearly leaves much more work to be done.
The Take Charge campaign provides local authorities and industry stakeholders with a wide range of creative assets available to use for free all year round, and the campaign has been refreshed every Halloween (to tie in with the zombie theme) since its launch – but there are plenty of non-zombie assets too for those who prefer a more conservative approach.
All of the assets can be downloaded from www.takecharge.org.uk and we urge local authorities, companies across the waste sector, and the manufacturers of electrical devices and batteries to support the campaign by distributing the assets to raise consumer awareness and stem the rising tide of battery fires in recycling and waste facilities.
For more information, you can visit www.esauk.org.
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Jacob Hayler is the Executive Director of the Environmental Services Association.
