Bryson Recycling has launched a battery recycling scheme which will provide over 200,000 households across Northern Ireland with a means of recycling batteries from home using their kerbside box recycling service.

The scheme, being delivered in partnership with Valpak and local Councils, will expand on the hugely successful introduction of Bryson’s battery recycling services in Armagh, Banbridge and Londonderry over the last three years, and will be available to Bryson box service customers from this week in Belfast, Castlereagh, Ballymena, Newtownabbey and Carrickfergus.

Over 600 million household batteries are sent to landfill every year in the UK, all of which are recyclable and Bryson hopes that the introduction of its initiative across Northern Ireland will help households here to make a significant contribution to reducing this figure and progressing towards targets set for recycling in the UK over the coming years. With the current level at just 3%, Bryson’s new scheme represents a significant step in the process of meeting the 10% target for 2010 and the 25% rate of recycling the UK has been tasked with achieving by 2012.

Announcing the initiative, Eric Randall, Director of Bryson Recycling, commented:

“Recycling has been a real success story in Northern Ireland over the last number of years, and we hope that battery recycling will be the next step in significantly reducing our impact on the environment. By making battery recycling as easy as possible for households we expect to see many people here taking advantage of the facility and continuing to work together to reduce waste and the demand we place on valuable natural resources. I would encourage as many people as possible to collect old, used and unwanted batteries and add these to their kerbside box each week.”

Duncan Simpson, Director of Marketing at Valpak, which operates a compliance scheme for battery recycling in conjunction with Bryson’s recycling service, said:

“We’re very pleased to be working with Bryson to deliver the first scheme of its kind in Northern Ireland. Battery recycling represents a key area for working towards creating more sustainable waste management practices, and we hope that households here will make the effort to minimise the volume of rubbish they throw away and dispose of their batteries in an environmentally friendly way.”

Under the scheme all batteries may be recycled, both rechargeable and non-rechargeable, and regardless of whether or not they are fully discharged. Householders in areas where the service is offered should place their used or unwanted batteries, including AA and AAA cells, button batteries, size C and D and any laptop and mobile phone batteries, in a clear plastic sandwich bag, seal it and place it in their Bryson kerbside box along with other materials for recycling.

Once collected, the batteries are sorted and the metals they contain recycled to produce new products.