Battery Recycling Program reaches milestone

FALLBROOK — Keep Fallbrook Clean and Green’s community program for recycling household dry cell batteries recently reached a milestone by sending its first shipment of used batteries collected in Fallbrook to the Battery Solutions Processing Site. The recycling program had expected to collect three 55-gallon drums of spent batteries by the end of a six-month period, but the three drums were filled to overflowing by the end of the fourth month. Response to the recycling program in Fallbrook has been enthusiastic and constant.

The program consists of multiple collections sites throughout Fallbrook: a curbside collection container in the parking lot at Fallbrook Public Utility District (FPUD) and three smaller containers at Joe’s Hardware Store, Major Market, Fallbrook Public Library and, newly added, at Albertson’s.

The recycling container at Joe’s Hardware, 640 South Main Street, is installed by the store’s battery display to make it easy for customers to recycle their old batteries as they buy new ones. At Major Market, the recycling container is easily accessible near the front door by the Customer Service area, and the library’s access is right inside their front door. Albertson’s has installed its container just inside the north doorway, right next to the plastic bag recycling bin.

Oversized batteries should not be forced into the small receptacles but taken to the FPUD parking lot and deposited in the bright green curbside container, easily visible in the FPUD lot at 990 East Mission Road.

Residents are reminded that household batteries cannot be disposed of in regular trash because of the hazardous materials they contain. Household batteries include alkaline batteries (AAA, AA, C, D and 9-volt), nickel-cadmium rechargeable batteries (NiCads), button batteries (small, round, silver-colored; used in watches and hearing aids) and lithium batteries (AA, C, 9-volt and coin; mainly used in computers and cameras).

The Household Battery Recycling Program is a cooperative enterprise sponsored by Keep Fallbrook Clean and Green and the Fallbrook Public Utility District and funded by a grant from the Fallbrook Angel Society. For more information, contact Anne Burdick of Keep Fallbrook Clean and Green at (760) 728-7828 or Noelle Denke, FPUD Community Relations Representative, at (760) 728-1125, ext. 1127.