Published: Tuesday, 16th March, 2010 11:33am

Council aims to boost recycling rates

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THE Council hopes to boost recycling rates by introducing new sites to drop off old batteries.

New legislation introduced by the European Parliament on February 1, means responsibility for the collection of batteries has shifted from local authorities to producers, while retailers who sell more than one pack of batteries a day have to provide collection bins for battery recycling.

Despite the change of responsibility, the Royal Borough is pro-actively supporting the initiative and working with battery compliance scheme BatteryBack to encourage people to recycle batteries from everyday household items such as mobile phones, laptops, hearing aids, watches, cameras, cordless power tools, torches, electric toothbrushes, electric razors and hand-held vacuum cleaners.

Lead member for public protection, Cllr Phil Bicknell said: "In the UK at present only three per cent of the current 30,000 tonnes of portable batteries that go onto the market each year are recycled. There are real benefits to reducing the amount of batteries going to landfill as they can leak harmful chemicals into the soil. The recycling target is 25% by 2012 with an increase of five per cent a year for the following few years so come on, Royal Borough residents, let's do our bit to help reach this goal."

From Friday, sites where people can drop off spent batteries will include York House in Sheet Street, Windsor, Maidenhead Town Hall in St Ives Road and Windsor Leisure Centre.

In addition, the bins will be found at various department stores and hardware shops in the borough. Residents can find their nearest collection point by visiting http://www.batteryback.org/battery-collection.html and entering their postcode.