New battery recycling regulations put before Parliament

From February 2010, certain retailers of household batteries will have to collect spent batteries in-store.

Regulations for the collection, treatment and recycling of waste batteries which were meant to come into force last year, have now been put before Parliament. According to the Department for Business and Regulatory Reform (BERR) the EU Batteries Directive will come into force on 5 May.

However retailers will not have to comply with in-store take-back until 1 February 2010. Other changes to the regulations mean a large number of retailers have been let off the hook and will not have to take-back spent batteries.

The draft regulations suggested all shops selling more than 16 kilogrammes of batteries a year would be expected to provide in-store facilities for waste batteries. The final regulations have set the threshold at 32 kilogrammes; which we worked out to about 12,000 AA or 400 D cell batteries.

The UK has been given a target of collecting 25 per cent of waste portable batteries by 2012 and 45 per cent by 2016. However the country does not have a good track record in collecting spent batteries from households.

There are a few kerbside schemes run by some local councils and stores such as PC World have battery banks instore already. Battery Back, a recycling initiative launched by WeeeCare, has also financed the collection and treatment and recovery of batteries and over the last year has been working to provide free collection points.

Members of the public can use its website to find if there is one local to them.

An Aldershot company Midex has also said it would extend Weecollectit; a trial service picking up household waste electrical goods and batteries that has been run in the South of England, to the rest of the country.