Regulators are looking at lithium-ion battery labeling requirements, but improper collection of the batteries is just one of their recycling challenges. | Allyson Kitts/Shutterstock
California officials are considering regulating lithium-ion battery labels, but an e-scrap processor says they’re missing a bigger issue: Battery-containing electronics are increasingly expensive to process.
Improperly disposed lithium-ion batteries can be a fire risk at e-scrap facilities. | anantachat/Shutterstock
Legislation making lithium-ion battery producers responsible for collecting and recycling the products they sell is advancing in California.
California regulators plan to lower the fees consumers pay to fund electronics recycling. The issue? The state is accumulating too much money.
California’s e-scrap program took a hit when ECS Refining closed in June 2018, but it was anything but a critical blow. Other local and national e-scrap companies took up the slack.
A major retailer will pay $7.4 million to settle allegations it again broke California law by illegally tossing used electronics and hazardous materials in the garbage.
Additional data protection and privacy laws are coming to San Francisco and elsewhere in the Golden State.
Whole Foods Market California and two companies it owns will pay over $1.6 million to settle allegations they improperly disposed of electronics and hazardous wastes.
Material at the Mesquite, Texas ECS Refining facility. E-Scrap News file photo.
E-scrap processor Dynamic Recycling has signed a deal to buy assets from bankrupt company ECS Refining. Meanwhile, environmental and cost complications are popping up around facility cleanup efforts.
It’s been 15 years since California’s e-scrap program was launched, and those years have brought significant changes to the end-of-life device stream. Now, administrators of the country’s first state program have adopted a vision for the future.
Processors handling non-CRT devices will be paid 60 cents a pound by the state of California, a 22 percent increase over their current payment rate.