5 ms·

User-replaceable batteries create a waste stream of “used” batteries. I wonder what the recycling rate of those used batteries is, compared to the recycling rat

by jl6 4y ago

User-replaceable batteries create a waste stream of “used” batteries. I wonder what the recycling rate of those used batteries is, compared to the recycling rate of iPhones and their embedded batteries? Gut feel here says way lower. If true, killing the user-replaceable battery might be a net win for reducing consumption of problematic materials.

CorrectHorseBat 4y ago
My gut says it's higher since I would expect people who care about replacing batteries also care about recycling the old ones. Why do you think it's way lower?
- jl6 4y ago
  The example I’m thinking of is when I sat next to someone in an airport who had just bought some garbage-tier “Samsung compatible” replacement battery from the duty free shop, for his garbage-tier phone. He popped in the new battery and tossed the old one in the trash. Meanwhile, I know loads of people who have traded in, or simply handed in, their old iPhones in an Apple Store. I can’t imagine anyone casually tossing an old iPhone in the trash the way my feckless bench-neighbour did.
  - 908B64B197 4y ago
    > Meanwhile, I know loads of people who have traded in, or simply handed in, their old iPhones in an Apple Store. I can’t imagine anyone casually tossing an old iPhone in the trash the way my feckless bench-neighbour did. Or just get the battery replaced at the Apple Store and keep using your phone an extra year or two. It's even cheaper than buying a new phone!
  - madeofpalk 4y ago
    I mean, it is at the airport. People function a lot different when travelling. I don't think there's much to an extrapolate out of regular behaviour from that observation.
  - KronisLV 4y ago
    > ...for his garbage-tier phone. As someone with an arguably garbage-tier phone, sans replaceable battery, I don't think anyone would let me trade it in for a new one or even some sort of a discount, because there isn't a name like Apple behind it, nor the support network. My previous phone that had replaceable batteries has two in total that I occasionally charge, so it can act as a temporary backup if anything happens to my current phone. At least once those are used up and no longer hold any sort of a charge, I'll be able to dispose of them in the supermarket battery collection point or something like that. I'm not sure whether I'd want to cram my current phone in there with its memory chips intact. I guess there are a lot of factors to consider, whether people can afford a certain device or whether they care about disposing of certain types of items responsibly being some of them. Some of this probably varies based on the region of the world as well.
  - das-hinterland 4y ago
    [flagged]
    - kalleboo 4y ago
      > most legit battery shops will recycle the old battery for free Will they recycle it, or take it and send it to Asia where it ends up in a landfill anyway?
    - misnome 4y ago
      I don’t know when you last travelled, but many airports are quite big and have more than one shop. It also might shock you to hear that other countries also have airports. People might also have bought phones in the past, so they might not be considered top-of-the-line any more.
    - kitsunesoba 4y ago
      > Does Samsung even make "garbage tier" phones? Some of their lowest end models, between their incredibly weak hardware and huge load of preinstalled crapware (some of which runs in the background), are pretty terrible user experiences. I hesitate to use the term “garbage tier” because it’s needlessly acerbic but it wouldn’t be an inaccurate descriptor.
  - kalleboo 4y ago
    I don't even know where I would be able to properly dispose of/recycle a Li-ion battery. City recycling only takes non-rechargeable batteries, and the drop box at the electronics store only takes whole devices with internal batteries (like shavers)
    - somehnguy 4y ago
      In general any big box store that sells devices containing lion/lipo batteries will also have a recycling point for them. I can't remember if there is an actual law governing that, but I assume it isn't out of the goodness of the corporations hearts. Stores like Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, Wegmans, Target, etc all have boxes you can drop bare lithium battery cells into. Usually right at the front of the store tucked off to the side somewhere. They usually have bags provided at the box to put the cells into. I deal with a lot of lipo batteries & don't want to be responsible for a fire, so I usually electrical tape the +/- terminals before dropping off as well.
      - kalleboo 4y ago
        I don't live in the US so it may be different but the big box stores near me all have signs on their dropboxes saying you can throw devices with internal batteries but not loose batteries
        somehnguy 4y ago
        Wrap it in tape with an LED attached. Now it’s a device with internal battery, problem solved :) Some hobby shops do nearly exactly this to get around import restrictions. Whether it’s inside something or not it’s still a lipo battery, imo it’s a silly rule and worth breaking.
  - freeone3000 4y ago
    Apple offers a financial incentive to trade in your old iPhone. That is the pure reason. And you have to say, tossing out the battery is much better than tossing out the entire phone, battery and all
    - misnome 4y ago
      > Apple offers a financial incentive to trade in your old iPhone. That is the pure reason. Is that… a bad thing?
      - freeone3000 4y ago
        It’s not likely to be offered for random $200 phones.
- orf 4y ago
  User replaceable batteries also covers “any old phone repair shop”. It’s quite possible that the aggregate recycling rates of these are not great.
  - safety1st 4y ago
    If you want to achieve a very high battery recycling rate: * Mandate that batteries be replaceable * Mandate that repair shops recycle used batteries rather than throw them away Mandates on consumers don't mean much because they're hard to enforce, but mandates on businesses are much easier. The consumer will come into the shop to get a new battery installed and drop off the old battery for recycling in the process. Maybe throw in a trade-in rebate for the repair shops or something to seal the deal.
    - danaris 4y ago
      You need to go a step further: * Mandate that the companies/organizations that claim to recycle batteries actually recycle them, with severe penalties for the ones that bid low and then just send the batteries to a landfill in another country.
ISL 4y ago
We have a battery-recycling bowl at home as well as drawers holding old phones. My guess is that batteries are more-often recycled than phones/laptops, even just on data-privacy issues alone.
sbuk 4y ago
This is a problem I have with the right to repair movement--what happens to the replaced part? This is hard to police within regulated businesses, but just look at the landfills and scrapyards from the times when more items were more easily user serviceable; it's not pretty. I'm all for enforcing user serviceability, however it has the potential to be a backwards step for the environment if stern statutes are not put in place and actively policed, with the onus being on the party performing the replacement.
- js2 4y ago
  When buying a lead-acid battery or a remanufactured car part, there's often a core charge that is rebated when you return the old part. The last battery I purchased it was $22 (on a $170 battery). Now, I would've returned the old battery anyway because it's easy, convenient, and what the heck else would I do with it, but $22 was also a pretty decent incentive. So I'd think you just need to get the incentives right: make it easy and convenient to return and provide a financial reason to do so. On the other hand, last year I replaced all the smoke alarms in my home. It is essentially impossible to recycle the old alarms. Here's what my town says: "Only a single household smoke alarm/detector will be accepted with your trash for garbage collection. If you have more than one, they must be disposed using one of these listed options; https://deq.nc.gov/conservation/recycling/general-recycling-information/special-recyclables/smoke-detectors https://deq.nc.gov/conservation/recycling/general-recycling-... or, check manufacturer for take-back program." Here's what my county says (in the "unacceptable items" section): "Smoke detectors contain trace amounts of radioactive material. The recommendation is for consumers to return the smoke detectors to the manufacturers or contact NC Radiation Protection at 919-814-2250." Here's what my state says: "The Solid Waste Section recommends that it is safe for a single household fire/smoke detector to be disposed of in a lined municipal solid waste landfill." No manufacturer has a take-bake program. The county isn't on the same page with the town and the state. So in the trash they went, one per week. Took 3 months to get rid of them all.
  - CorrectHorseBat 4y ago
    Next time buy optical smoke alarms, they are better [1] and don't contain radioactive materials. [1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DuAeaIcAXtg&t=1196s&pp=ygUWc21va2UgYWxhcm0gdGVjaG5vbG9neQ%3D%3D https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DuAeaIcAXtg&t=1196s&pp=ygUWc21...
RNAlfons 4y ago
Apple could just reward returns of old batteries. It shouldn't be that hard for a company with so much know how and control over their products.
totalZero 4y ago
By your logic, user-replaceable filters create a waste stream of "used" filters, and user-replaceable light bulbs create a waste stream of "used" light bulbs. I personally like nonserviceable batteries because I want my devices to be water resistant, but I'd be more hesitant to throw a battery in the trash than I would be to throw a dead device in the trash. People have the option of recycling used devices, whether they be battery devices or smartphone devices, at a multitude of retailers.
- hinkley 4y ago
  The light bulb cartels are making lightbulbs that last 18 months on purpose. We should have had 20 year light bulbs fifty years ago. Only the LEDs I have in table lamps have survived more than five years. All enclosed bulbs die from cheap components and heat damage.
  - iamerroragent 4y ago
    "Only the LEDs I have in table lamps have survived more than five years. All enclosed bulbs die from cheap components and heat damage. " Part of the problem is trying to make LEDs work in our preexisting lighting systems which requires components to make a low voltage DC light work with our existing AC wiring. https://hackaday.com/2019/02/05/what-happened-to-the-100000-hour-led-bulbs/ https://hackaday.com/2019/02/05/what-happened-to-the-100000-... https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-l-e-d-quandary-why-theres-no-such-thing-as-built-to-last https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-l-e-d-quanda... > “My starting point is, get the economics right,” Tim Cooper, a design professor who heads the sustainable-consumption research group at Nottingham Trent University, told me. It’s already possible to buy durable products, he said—Miele washing machines, Vitsoe shelving, Jaguar cars. But, because such products command premium prices, they remain niche goods; by Cooper’s estimate they make up less than five per cent of the market. To truly change a light bulb will require policy changes—whether regulatory, market-based, or voluntary within industries—that support longer product lifetimes
    - alpaca128 4y ago
wittenbunk 4y ago
Is this satire?
foooobaba 4y ago
It’s annoying but not super hard to replace apple batteries, atleast for iPhone you can just buy a $30 kit on amazon and replace it, even with a higher capacity one too. It could be made easier but it takes less than 30m start to finish, and there are plenty youtube videos if you’ve never done it before.
- philistine 4y ago
  Are you sure your phone is still waterproof?
  - foooobaba 4y ago
    Yeah, the kit comes with a new seal as well.
iamerroragent 4y ago
Instead of replacing a battery people replace the device. Is that a net win in your book?
- sbuk 4y ago
  Depends on what happens to the old device? Reuse? Great! Recycled? Just as great! In a drawer, gathering dust? Schrödinger's e-waste. Thrown away? Very bad.
  - iamerroragent 4y ago
    So it's easier to make use of an old device when the battery holds a charge. You can recycle batteries.
    - sbuk 4y ago
      So get it replaced. You're implying that this is an ordeal, when it simply isn't. Using a device until it no longer functions is the best option, clearly. If it's still functional, reuse it or have it recycled, safely and properly. Where is the issue? The option to extend the useful life exists where the existing battery can be replaced and, if done properly, recycled. You trying to suggest that user replaceable batteries are the best option. I'm not sure that this is necessarily true. While it is beneficial that these devices are easier to repair, the are downsides to this. The obvious one is how many people will responsibly recycle their batteries once replaced? A battery left in a drawer is as bad as it not being recycled or being irresponsibly disposed of. The point is, it isn't as open and shut as you are implying.
      - iamerroragent 4y ago
        "The obvious one is how many people will responsibly recycle their batteries once replaced?" Okay: The obvious one is how many people will responsibly recycle their devices once replaced? "A battery left in a drawer is as bad as it not being recycled or being irresponsibly disposed of." Okay: A device left in a drawer is as bad as it not being recycled or being irresponsibly disposed of. Though previously you just called that Schrodinger's device, so now I fail to see how device in drawer is worse than device and battery in landfill.

by jl6 4y ago

CorrectHorseBat 4y ago

My gut says it's higher since I would expect people who care about replacing batteries also care about recycling the old ones. Why do you think it's way lower?

jl6 4y ago
The example I’m thinking of is when I sat next to someone in an airport who had just bought some garbage-tier “Samsung compatible” replacement battery from the duty free shop, for his garbage-tier phone. He popped in the new battery and tossed the old one in the trash. Meanwhile, I know loads of people who have traded in, or simply handed in, their old iPhones in an Apple Store. I can’t imagine anyone casually tossing an old iPhone in the trash the way my feckless bench-neighbour did.
- 908B64B197 4y ago
  > Meanwhile, I know loads of people who have traded in, or simply handed in, their old iPhones in an Apple Store. I can’t imagine anyone casually tossing an old iPhone in the trash the way my feckless bench-neighbour did. Or just get the battery replaced at the Apple Store and keep using your phone an extra year or two. It's even cheaper than buying a new phone!
- madeofpalk 4y ago
  I mean, it is at the airport. People function a lot different when travelling. I don't think there's much to an extrapolate out of regular behaviour from that observation.
- KronisLV 4y ago
  > ...for his garbage-tier phone. As someone with an arguably garbage-tier phone, sans replaceable battery, I don't think anyone would let me trade it in for a new one or even some sort of a discount, because there isn't a name like Apple behind it, nor the support network. My previous phone that had replaceable batteries has two in total that I occasionally charge, so it can act as a temporary backup if anything happens to my current phone. At least once those are used up and no longer hold any sort of a charge, I'll be able to dispose of them in the supermarket battery collection point or something like that. I'm not sure whether I'd want to cram my current phone in there with its memory chips intact. I guess there are a lot of factors to consider, whether people can afford a certain device or whether they care about disposing of certain types of items responsibly being some of them. Some of this probably varies based on the region of the world as well.
- das-hinterland 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - kalleboo 4y ago
    > most legit battery shops will recycle the old battery for free Will they recycle it, or take it and send it to Asia where it ends up in a landfill anyway?
  - misnome 4y ago
    I don’t know when you last travelled, but many airports are quite big and have more than one shop. It also might shock you to hear that other countries also have airports. People might also have bought phones in the past, so they might not be considered top-of-the-line any more.
  - kitsunesoba 4y ago
    > Does Samsung even make "garbage tier" phones? Some of their lowest end models, between their incredibly weak hardware and huge load of preinstalled crapware (some of which runs in the background), are pretty terrible user experiences. I hesitate to use the term “garbage tier” because it’s needlessly acerbic but it wouldn’t be an inaccurate descriptor.
- kalleboo 4y ago
  I don't even know where I would be able to properly dispose of/recycle a Li-ion battery. City recycling only takes non-rechargeable batteries, and the drop box at the electronics store only takes whole devices with internal batteries (like shavers)
  - somehnguy 4y ago
    In general any big box store that sells devices containing lion/lipo batteries will also have a recycling point for them. I can't remember if there is an actual law governing that, but I assume it isn't out of the goodness of the corporations hearts. Stores like Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, Wegmans, Target, etc all have boxes you can drop bare lithium battery cells into. Usually right at the front of the store tucked off to the side somewhere. They usually have bags provided at the box to put the cells into. I deal with a lot of lipo batteries & don't want to be responsible for a fire, so I usually electrical tape the +/- terminals before dropping off as well.
    - kalleboo 4y ago
      I don't live in the US so it may be different but the big box stores near me all have signs on their dropboxes saying you can throw devices with internal batteries but not loose batteries
      - somehnguy 4y ago
        Wrap it in tape with an LED attached. Now it’s a device with internal battery, problem solved :) Some hobby shops do nearly exactly this to get around import restrictions. Whether it’s inside something or not it’s still a lipo battery, imo it’s a silly rule and worth breaking.
- freeone3000 4y ago
  Apple offers a financial incentive to trade in your old iPhone. That is the pure reason. And you have to say, tossing out the battery is much better than tossing out the entire phone, battery and all
  - misnome 4y ago
    > Apple offers a financial incentive to trade in your old iPhone. That is the pure reason. Is that… a bad thing?
    - freeone3000 4y ago
      It’s not likely to be offered for random $200 phones.
orf 4y ago
User replaceable batteries also covers “any old phone repair shop”. It’s quite possible that the aggregate recycling rates of these are not great.
- safety1st 4y ago
  If you want to achieve a very high battery recycling rate: * Mandate that batteries be replaceable * Mandate that repair shops recycle used batteries rather than throw them away Mandates on consumers don't mean much because they're hard to enforce, but mandates on businesses are much easier. The consumer will come into the shop to get a new battery installed and drop off the old battery for recycling in the process. Maybe throw in a trade-in rebate for the repair shops or something to seal the deal.
  - danaris 4y ago
    You need to go a step further: * Mandate that the companies/organizations that claim to recycle batteries actually recycle them, with severe penalties for the ones that bid low and then just send the batteries to a landfill in another country.

ISL 4y ago

We have a battery-recycling bowl at home as well as drawers holding old phones. My guess is that batteries are more-often recycled than phones/laptops, even just on data-privacy issues alone.

sbuk 4y ago

This is a problem I have with the right to repair movement--what happens to the replaced part? This is hard to police within regulated businesses, but just look at the landfills and scrapyards from the times when more items were more easily user serviceable; it's not pretty. I'm all for enforcing user serviceability, however it has the potential to be a backwards step for the environment if stern statutes are not put in place and actively policed, with the onus being on the party performing the replacement.

js2 4y ago
When buying a lead-acid battery or a remanufactured car part, there's often a core charge that is rebated when you return the old part. The last battery I purchased it was $22 (on a $170 battery). Now, I would've returned the old battery anyway because it's easy, convenient, and what the heck else would I do with it, but $22 was also a pretty decent incentive. So I'd think you just need to get the incentives right: make it easy and convenient to return and provide a financial reason to do so. On the other hand, last year I replaced all the smoke alarms in my home. It is essentially impossible to recycle the old alarms. Here's what my town says: "Only a single household smoke alarm/detector will be accepted with your trash for garbage collection. If you have more than one, they must be disposed using one of these listed options; https://deq.nc.gov/conservation/recycling/general-recycling-information/special-recyclables/smoke-detectors https://deq.nc.gov/conservation/recycling/general-recycling-... or, check manufacturer for take-back program." Here's what my county says (in the "unacceptable items" section): "Smoke detectors contain trace amounts of radioactive material. The recommendation is for consumers to return the smoke detectors to the manufacturers or contact NC Radiation Protection at 919-814-2250." Here's what my state says: "The Solid Waste Section recommends that it is safe for a single household fire/smoke detector to be disposed of in a lined municipal solid waste landfill." No manufacturer has a take-bake program. The county isn't on the same page with the town and the state. So in the trash they went, one per week. Took 3 months to get rid of them all.
- CorrectHorseBat 4y ago
  Next time buy optical smoke alarms, they are better [1] and don't contain radioactive materials. [1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DuAeaIcAXtg&t=1196s&pp=ygUWc21va2UgYWxhcm0gdGVjaG5vbG9neQ%3D%3D https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DuAeaIcAXtg&t=1196s&pp=ygUWc21...

RNAlfons 4y ago

Apple could just reward returns of old batteries. It shouldn't be that hard for a company with so much know how and control over their products.

totalZero 4y ago

By your logic, user-replaceable filters create a waste stream of "used" filters, and user-replaceable light bulbs create a waste stream of "used" light bulbs. I personally like nonserviceable batteries because I want my devices to be water resistant, but I'd be more hesitant to throw a battery in the trash than I would be to throw a dead device in the trash. People have the option of recycling used devices, whether they be battery devices or smartphone devices, at a multitude of retailers.

hinkley 4y ago
The light bulb cartels are making lightbulbs that last 18 months on purpose. We should have had 20 year light bulbs fifty years ago. Only the LEDs I have in table lamps have survived more than five years. All enclosed bulbs die from cheap components and heat damage.
- iamerroragent 4y ago
  "Only the LEDs I have in table lamps have survived more than five years. All enclosed bulbs die from cheap components and heat damage. " Part of the problem is trying to make LEDs work in our preexisting lighting systems which requires components to make a low voltage DC light work with our existing AC wiring. https://hackaday.com/2019/02/05/what-happened-to-the-100000-hour-led-bulbs/ https://hackaday.com/2019/02/05/what-happened-to-the-100000-... https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-l-e-d-quandary-why-theres-no-such-thing-as-built-to-last https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-l-e-d-quanda... > “My starting point is, get the economics right,” Tim Cooper, a design professor who heads the sustainable-consumption research group at Nottingham Trent University, told me. It’s already possible to buy durable products, he said—Miele washing machines, Vitsoe shelving, Jaguar cars. But, because such products command premium prices, they remain niche goods; by Cooper’s estimate they make up less than five per cent of the market. To truly change a light bulb will require policy changes—whether regulatory, market-based, or voluntary within industries—that support longer product lifetimes
  - alpaca128 4y ago

wittenbunk 4y ago

Is this satire?

foooobaba 4y ago

It’s annoying but not super hard to replace apple batteries, atleast for iPhone you can just buy a $30 kit on amazon and replace it, even with a higher capacity one too. It could be made easier but it takes less than 30m start to finish, and there are plenty youtube videos if you’ve never done it before.

philistine 4y ago
Are you sure your phone is still waterproof?
- foooobaba 4y ago
  Yeah, the kit comes with a new seal as well.

iamerroragent 4y ago

Instead of replacing a battery people replace the device. Is that a net win in your book?

sbuk 4y ago
Depends on what happens to the old device? Reuse? Great! Recycled? Just as great! In a drawer, gathering dust? Schrödinger's e-waste. Thrown away? Very bad.
- iamerroragent 4y ago
  So it's easier to make use of an old device when the battery holds a charge. You can recycle batteries.
  - sbuk 4y ago
    So get it replaced. You're implying that this is an ordeal, when it simply isn't. Using a device until it no longer functions is the best option, clearly. If it's still functional, reuse it or have it recycled, safely and properly. Where is the issue? The option to extend the useful life exists where the existing battery can be replaced and, if done properly, recycled. You trying to suggest that user replaceable batteries are the best option. I'm not sure that this is necessarily true. While it is beneficial that these devices are easier to repair, the are downsides to this. The obvious one is how many people will responsibly recycle their batteries once replaced? A battery left in a drawer is as bad as it not being recycled or being irresponsibly disposed of. The point is, it isn't as open and shut as you are implying.
    - iamerroragent 4y ago
      "The obvious one is how many people will responsibly recycle their batteries once replaced?" Okay: The obvious one is how many people will responsibly recycle their devices once replaced? "A battery left in a drawer is as bad as it not being recycled or being irresponsibly disposed of." Okay: A device left in a drawer is as bad as it not being recycled or being irresponsibly disposed of. Though previously you just called that Schrodinger's device, so now I fail to see how device in drawer is worse than device and battery in landfill.