Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Damaged lithium battery disposal?
Can anyone advise on how I can safely dispose of an old and swollen lithium phone battery, just discovered in a drawer?
It can’t go in general rubbish or the battery bin at Tesco because it’s damaged and a fire risk; Haringey’s website directs me to the City Corporation hazardous waste collection site, which then says it doesn’t collect batteries; online there are numerous warnings about the danger it poses and ways to keep it safely but no actual information on how to get rid of it on any commercial or official site (including .gov.uk) that I can find. Western Road recycling don’t answer their phone and presumably won’t take it anyway, if the website’s to be believed.
Right now it’s inside a metal cake tin in my garden, but this isn’t a proper solution, so any advice would be very welcome.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Jeremyb
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This says Western Road takes them?
https://www.nlwa.gov.uk/places-to-recycle/haringey-western-road
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Permalink Reply by Don
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Thanks for the thought Jeremy, but a swollen battery counts as hazardous waste, apparently, and I can’t get proper clarification as to whether Western Road will accept it — hence the website’s referral to the City’s hazardous waste collection service… which doesn’t take batteries! (Or much else that’s actually hazardous, bizarrely, by the looks of it.) So I’m still none the wiser!
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Permalink Reply by Martin (Woodside)
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Just put it in the designated waste battery receptacle in your local supermarket.
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Martin — Thanks, but I really don’t know if that’s safe. The whole point of a swollen lithium battery is that it becomes a serious fire risk that may spontaneously combust, as I understand it, so putting it with a lot of other batteries seems very risky. There have been several recent cases of house fires — and even one in a dustcart — caused by defective batteries (albeit predominantly e-scooter ones that are far larger, of course), and I don’t want to go down in history as the person who burnt down Tesco in Green Lanes by igniting a bin full of lithium!
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I can understand your concern Don, maybe it needs a Chernobyl style sarcophagus. If it was me I'd make sure that it was completely discharged and still bin it at the supermarket.
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