10Jun

8 battery recycling companies shortlisted

Posted on 10th June, 2009

The EA have today announced the total list of applicants for battery recycling scheme approval.

  • BatteryBack
  • Budget Pack
  • CCR UK
  • Econo -Batt
  • ERP
  • Exel Europe
  • Repic
  • Valpak

This is the first hurdle, costing each company £17,000. Following eventual approval each of the qualifying companies will be required to commit a further £118,000 to the EA before they can start trading. If all 8 are approved then the total cost of compliance fees alone will be £1,080,000, add to this the EA registration fee of £680 per producer and the total EA fees, to be born by producers, exceeds £8 million. With the likelihood of lower collection densities and reduced effiencies the potential cost to producers could exceed £20 million in year one alone. Unlike the parcel business which is a multi-billion pound sector, battery collection will consist of a series of small hazardous waste collections. It should be possible to provide a collection service for the whole country at a cost of less than £5 million a year. Too much competition could prove to be expensive for producers, retailers and consumers.

In reality it is probable that a number of schemes will not reach final approval. Producers must be careful when choosing a scheme that it has in place a coherent collection and treatment model that can provide low cost compliance next year and for years afterwards.

Peter Hunt, Chairman of BatteryBack, explained

“Our scheme is backed by Veolia and WasteCare who together already handle hazardous and difficult waste from over 40,000 sites in Britain. We are already offering a low cost collection service for batteries and for this reason have guaranteed producers a compliance cost of just 1 penny a battery”.