Ever wondered what to do with all those old batteries, x-rays, DVDs, phones and cameras lying around the house?
Don't throw them in your wheelie bin! Instead stop by the Hume Global Learning Centre at Broadmeadows and Craigieburn and drop them into Hume's new Recycling Stations.
The Recycling Stations are designed for household items that cannot be recycled through kerbside recycling and should not be disposed of through kerbside waste collection.
Items are securely collected by our contractor and the data protected by removing and destroying personal information on X-Rays while phones are restored to factory settings. If you are concerned for your privacy, please remove personal information prior to placing your items in the recycling hub.
Items placed in the Recycling Stations are reused and upcycled where possible and if they can't be repurposed are recycled.
Many of the above items can be recycled and put to use again and again.
To provide an example, Sustainability Victoria estimates there are more than 22 million discarded mobile handsets in Australia, a number that grows by more than one million each year.
A million mobile phones contain an estimated 15-16 tonnes of copper, 340-350 kilograms of silver and 24-34 kilograms of gold. That's a lot of precious resources we're throwing away every year!
Many of the materials recovered through recycling e-waste are non-renewable. However, if properly recycled, these materials and parts can be recycled and used again and again.
The new Recycling Stations are located at the Hume Global Learning Centres in Broadmeadows and Craigieburn. A third Recycling Station will be located at the Hume Global Learning Centre – Sunbury when it opens to the public in 2019.