How and why to dispose of batteries and where can they be taken in your city?

While the average European has long been aware of where to give batteries and why this should be done, for the average Russian this question is still a mystery. Well there, many of us do not know at all that batteries are not just rubbish and that they need to be disposed of! If you are interested in the problem of environmental pollution by toxic waste, we think you are ready to contribute to the preservation of our planet. And in order for the first attempt to turn over the batteries to recycling not discourage the whole ecological mood, we will provide a small educational program on this topic.

Maybe you can stand aside?

Have you ever felt the negative effects of a decaying battery? We are not. So why not throw away batteries? Maybe all this hype around the batteries is more voluntary than mandatory? It seems that it is precisely such reflections that incite a good part of Russians to remain inactive.

Of course, the harmful substances from the batteries can be treated as waste that we drain into rivers, the exhaust gases that we breathe, the chemicals that we water plants. All this, unfortunately, has long been the norm, and the human body has become so tenacious that it can function even in such conditions. But in the situation with batteries in the garbage there is one important difference: this is one of the few threats that an ordinary person can actively influence.

An ordinary citizen is too small when it comes to industrial scale, and you personally are not able to influence the pollution of rivers, air or products by large companies. So do you really not want to take this rare opportunity and make a real contribution to the preservation of the environment, your health and the well-being of your children?

Are batteries so dangerous?

If you are imbued with the speech above, then it will be useful for you to find out exactly how waste batteries pollute the environment. I would not want to escalate, but in any locality precisely because of the illiteracy of the population in the field of disposal of chemical compounds from batteries, the soil, air, groundwater and products grown in this area are contaminated, respectively. Why is that so? See for yourself ...

• A person does not know where to put the used battery, and throws it into the bin with household waste. But he is not alone: ​​out of ignorance or because of human laziness, tons of waste batteries are sent to household waste. In Moscow alone, about 15 million batteries accumulate in landfills during the year, and this is despite the fact that there are quite a few activists who advocate the collection, proper storage and recycling of batteries.
• In a landfill, this entire time bomb begins to rust, and the protective metal sheath collapses over time under the influence of corrosion. Now dangerous heavy metals are only separated from you by time. Zinc, manganese, cadmium, nickel, mercury and alkalis, which until recently worked for the benefit of mankind, generating energy, penetrate the earth and water, poisoning them. From there, to your table, and then to your kidneys or liver, where these heavy metals settle, the path is pretty short.

Interesting

It is estimated that 1 battery in trash can contaminate about 20 square meters of soil and 400 liters of water.

• When garbage in a landfill is burned, the batteries heat up and release dioxins into the atmosphere, thereby also contaminating the air.Take into account the water cycle in nature, and it turns out that with rain the dioxins will fall both into the soil and into groundwater. At the same time, while in the air, they move tens of kilometers, infecting all large territories. Although, as you already understood, there is no 100% clean soil, water and air even on some remote farm.
• Plants grown on contaminated water and animals grown on contaminated plants are on your table. In addition, dioxins enter the body from the air. Heavy metals settle in the organs, causing problems with the liver, kidneys, and often with the work of the brain and general well-being.

By the way ...

Do you think that boiling saves water from all harmful substances? Unfortunately, it is not so easy to get rid of heavy metals.

It seems that the disposal of used batteries is still worth it to carefully study the issue, especially since now you will have a chance to compare recycling in the recent past and at the moment and understand that contributing to the preservation of the environment is much easier than it sounds.

Battery Disposal in the Recent Past

Surely interested in the topic garbage sorting and processing, you stumbled on the network to less recent articles, from which you can only make out that in Russia, with the disposal of batteries, everything is very, very bad. Let's not lie, it was like that: some people even took old batteries with them to Europe to be taken to reception points there. Agree, not the easiest and most affordable way. But, as they say, "for lack of a better" this method did not seem absurd.

• All the recycling enterprises that could properly dispose of the old batteries after the collapse of the Union remained in Kazakhstan and Ukraine, respectively, in Russia it was all about collecting for safe storage pending export or the appearance of a recycling line in the country.
• There were not so many activists at that time, and propaganda for collecting batteries was carried out only in large cities, and that was not too zealous. As a result, it was not possible to collect lots sufficient for export abroad for processing, and all these batteries were simply stored in anticipation of their time.

Important!

Some were looking for the answer to the question of how to dispose of batteries at home, but without specialized equipment this is not possible.

• Even right-minded people with an understanding of the problem simply did not know where to put the old batteries: before they should have been taken in local DEZ, ZhEK and REU, but even there they could very well have looked at you with surprised eyes. At the beginning of the two thousandth campaign, IKEA conducted the collection campaign, but then it had to be curtailed due to a complaint from Rostekhnadzor.

Interesting

Since the batteries cannot be dumped into the water or burned due to decomposition, the activists collected and stored batteries right at home for a long time. A little later, large environmental organizations organized special burials.

Considering the circumstances at that time, the idea of ​​throwing the batteries into a special box in some shopping center in Germany during the trip no longer seems so absurd. But now the situation with recycling is very different.

What do we have at the moment?

You are incredibly lucky if you are interested in recycling batteries just now, because now you can turn in batteries in every major city in just 5 minutes without breaking the thresholds of reception points that always refuse service. You no longer need to look for DEZA and other points, and the batteries themselves are no longer just stored, they are recycled. And all this is happening not abroad, but here in Chelyabinsk.

By the way ...

IKEA recently resumed the collection of batteries and energy-saving lamps, as evidenced by the information on their website. Boxes for gathering without the need to learn anything from the staff - ideal for those who often go there!

In 2013, MegapolisResurs, a company engaged in the utilization of various wastes, launched a line for the processing of batteries, household and industrial, on the line for the recycling of microchips. The owners claim that the processing efficiency on their line is higher than at some European recycling plants, and MegapolisResource accepts batches not only from all over Russia, but also from near and far abroad.

In just a couple of years, by launching an affiliate program, they were able to make the collection and recycling of batteries truly affordable. Now you have a chance to turn over the batteries just on the way to work: such large companies as MTS, MegaMarket, Auchan and a dozen more less well-known companies participate in the partnership program. It is in their branches that you can easily hand over old batteries absolutely free.

Important!

Do not expect to get money for the delivery of batteries: there is no such practice anywhere, since the disposal process is quite expensive. For legal entities, such a service will even be paid! Moreover, if you decide to hand over a large batch of batteries (from 10 kg) not through partners, but directly to MegapolisResource, then you will have to pay for their processing, it does not matter if you are a company or an individual.

How is recycling carried out? Batteries are crushed, iron is separated by magnetic tape, and then, using alkaline reactions, zinc and manganese salts, as well as graphite, are isolated. And it only seems that this is a matter of two minutes. One battery lasts about four days! Of course, about 2 tons of batteries are processed in one such cycle, but these 2 tons need to be collected first.

Interesting

One of the partners of the line, the Flacon design factory, recently installed a vending machine on its territory, in which food and drinks can be bought not for money, but for outdated finger batteries.

The problem is that battery recycling is a complex, long and expensive process, and the volume of consignments arriving at the plant is still too small to establish a line. Because of this, the batteries are still sorted manually, since the cost of turning on the automatic sorting apparatus will be inappropriate. Moreover, processing this process so far can only be called conditionally: only iron obtained from batteries can be sold, while the volumes of production of the remaining substances are insufficient to interest the wholesale buyer.

It turns out that for more efficient operation of the country's only processing line, it is necessary to provide it with material for processing. And this means that the country's advancement in this area depends directly on each of us.