What are lead acid batteries? Am I using them?

These are batteries made up of lead and acid, highly poisonous. You and I use lead-acid batteries in our cars, trucks, bikes, boats and inverters. 

What is the problem with their usage?

Primarily, its not the usage but the disposal that is an issue, and one that can’t be ignored any longer!

• The heavy lead content and corrosivity of lead acid batteries is extremely hazardous for both humans and the environment.
• Most developed countries ban disposal of used lead-acid batteries in solid landfills

Is Recycling the batteries the solution then?

Very very doubtful, considering the fact that:

• Recycling lead acid batteries has led to lead poisoning in workers and their children.
• At the recycling sites, lead finds its way into land and from their into water and crops.
• Lead acid battery recycling sites have air laden with lead – a highly toxic metal.
• Recycling of lead-acid batteries has been moved out of the developed to the developing world. No brownie points for guessing why! An excerpt from a Greenpeace report by Madeleine Cobbing and Simon Divecha reads thus:

“In 1993, Greenpeace researchers followed the toxic battery waste trade to numerous lead-acid battery recycling facilities in Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand. This research followed similar investigations conducted by the Center for Investigative Reporting in Taiwan in 1990, and other researchers in Brazil and Mexico in recent years.

Pieced together, these investigations reveal that industrial countries are not shipping their batteries to environmentally sound recycling operations. In fact, U.S., U.K. and Australian automobile batteries are being burned in extremely dangerous and dirty Third World factories. These secondary lead smelters are discharging acid into waterways, dumping residual wastes outside property gates, and poisoning workers, villagers and their families.

The investigations reveal the “double standards” inherent in all types of toxic waste trade. These double standards are reflected in all of the lead waste recycling processes that can potentially harm people and the environment, including transportation, workplace and ambient air emissions, storage and handling of scrap batteries, and slag disposal.

For example, people working in lead recycling facilities in the U.S. are required to wear full-body protective gear to shield themselves from hazardous fumes and burning liquids. In one facility in the Philippines, Greenpeace witnessed factory workers pulling batteries apart with their bare hands. In Indonesia, villagers reported that lead ash from the factory falls in their food at night.”

(Read the full article at http://www.things.org/~jym/greenpeace/myth-of-battery-recycling.html)

What can we do at our level?

• Do not throw away spent batteries in garbage dumps. Exchange (and only exchange) for new batteries. Leave the disposal to the experts/concerned authorities.
• Ensure that you service the batteries regularly to imporove their life. Inspect them periodically to check for acid leaks.
• Buy batteries that last long. Its a small difference in terms of price while buying but weighed against the benefit to the environment, it makes a whole lot of sense.
• When storing batteries and also when using them with inverters, make sure that they are placed in an acid-resistant rank. Prevent acid running off to the floor or other areas to avoid any contamination. 

The BIG picture – What is the Real solution?

No, it does not lie in any of the above – Not careful disposal, not recycling and not the little things we can do. 

The only real solution lies in moving towards lead free batteries.  As long as the third world offers itself as a cheap recycling base, the industrialised world will not invest in enough research to eliminate lead from batteries. Even though they completely realise the perils themselves. The ngos in third world countries need to get their act together and push their lawmakers to put in place laws that completely ban ‘recycling’ of these killer batteries.

Tags: battery recycling, lead acid batteries, lead poisoning