Life Green Batteries Project

• Starting page
• presentation of the project
• why should I care
• batteries & accumulators
• current situation
  • batteries
  • accumulators
• legislation
• recycling programs in the EU
• outcomes of recycling project Life Green Batteries
• the life environment funding project

MANAGEMENT OF BATTERIES AND
ACCUMULATORS

Country

Netherlands

Recycling system 

Stichting Batterijen (STIBAT) was formed to enable Dutch battery manufacturers and importers to fulfil their legal obligation to collect and recycle spent batteries.

Type of batteries

Small batteries (responsible for collecting and recycling batteries that weigh up to one kilogram)

Recycling rates

The collection rate for 2001 is up to 70%. This rate seems to be stabilized in this level during the last years.

National Legislation

Battery Decree 1993/1995

Legal status of the organization

Stibat executes a joint collection and processing plan on behalf of battery manufacturers and importers. When companies join the Stibat Plan, they comply thereby with the Batteries Disposal Decree of January 31, 1995, which holds them responsible for recovering batteries they market once they are spent. After the first Stibat Plan (1995-1998), the Stibat Implementation Plan II (1998-2003) was approved by the minister of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment in 1999. The approval of that plan stipulates that 90% of all spent batteries must be collected separately in 2003.
A new method for estimating the collection rate has also been approved. This method was developed co-operatively by Stibat, the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) and the Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment.

Activities

Collection. The collection is performed by municipalities, schools, and outside of the city limits. More specifically, Dutch municipalities are responsible for separate collection of small chemical waste (scw), including batteries. There are several different collection systems in place, according to reports from the municipalities. In some towns, inhabitants can use a "green box", others have a "chemocar", and in others, the inhabitants bring their batteries to the municipal scw depot. Stibat also provides extra collection sites within town limits, to supplement municipal scw systems.
Retail is also a significant supplementary collection channel for spent batteries in the Netherlands. At many supermarkets, photo shops, toy stores, department stores, telephone and electronics stores, do-it-yourself stores and household appliance stores, customers can drop off their spent batteries. Also, many elementary schools collect batteries. Even recreation facilities, such as campgrounds and bungalow parks, are becoming more and more environmentally conscious and are offering their guests places where they can drop off spent batteries. The batteries are picked up by Stibat approved contractors. These collectors pick up spent batteries from all Dutch municipalities, and store them temporarily in their depots. They conduct a preliminary inspection, pack the batteries in special plastic bins, and bring them to the central national depot which is also Stibat's sorting station.
Sorting. All batteries that are collected by the municipalities are brought to Stibat's national depot, where the total Dutch battery intake weight is measured and recorded, and the batteries are pre-sorted based on their type and size to facilitate further processing. Sorting divides the batteries into several streams, the largest of which (about 60% of all batteries collected) is cylindrical consumer batteries (AAA's, AA's, C's and D's). These cylindrical batteries are further sorted by chemical type, such as: alkaline batteries, alkaline UV (lead-free), zinc carbon batteries, nickel cadmium /nickel metal hydride batteries, and mercury oxide batteries. These separate, pure battery streams meet the acceptance criteria of the specialized processors. The remaining battery streams are car batteries, electric fence batteries, batteries with soldered connections, rechargeable packs, batteries from Polaroid-type cameras, button cells in blister packs, battery-containing objects, and batteries that are contaminated. All these batteries are sorted visually according to their chemical composition so they can be transferred to specialized (mainly foreign) processing facilities where they are recycled.
Transportation to processing facilities. All the batteries that were sorted at the sorting station are eventually shipped to specialized processing facilities in Western Europe, which recover the metals from the batteries.
Recovering raw materials. All the collected spent batteries are recycled at a number of different processing plants in Western Europe. For example, zinc carbon batteries are processed by Nedstaal in the Netherlands. Lead-containing batteries go to the Belgian company Campine in Beerse. The nickel metal hydride, nickel cadmium and lithium ion batteries (which are all rechargeable batteries), are processed at the French company SNAM in Lyon. Button cells are processed by the Swiss company Batrec. The following metals are recovered through recycling: zinc, steel, nickel, cadmium, lead and manganese. The remaining slag is used in asphalt road construction.

Financial data:
income - outcome

Income. Stibat's income originates from the disposal fees paid by each participant. The fee is a set amount for each battery type. Strict monitoring is used to ensure that the fees are sufficient, and that a balance between costs and income is achieved.
Expenses. The expenses Stibat incurs in efficient implementation of the Stibat Plan consist mainly of transport, sorting, and processing costs. Another source of expense is the public awareness campaigns that aim to increase the collection rate.

Dissemination activities

"Empty batteries? Bring them in!" is the motto for the national campaign that Stibat conducts year-round. The goal of the campaign is to continually motivate the public to drop off their spent batteries, both because this reminder is needed, and in order to inform people about where they can bring-in their batteries. Television and radio commercials have been run, text advertisements have been placed in many newspapers, magazines and newsletters, and posters have been hung in tram and bus stops, subway and train stations. Additionally Stibat develops a variety of community programs, such as recreation, school, retail and public awareness programs.