Tesla’s former CTO is building a giant lithium-ion battery recycling operation
Back in my day, I worked at Bestbuy and if you have ever been in one, you may notice that we have a "recycle" area in the front of the store. It is a separated bin, labelled with "wires", "cds", "batteries", etc. The one that always confused me the most was "batteries" since almost EVERY time they would empty that bin into our recycle bin in the back, they would dump the batteries into the trash because <i>almost</i> all of them were non-lithium-ion. My manager said we couldn't recycle regular batteries so they needed thrown away and sorting through the absolute mound of batteries was too much to do.<p>I know we would receive laptop batteries, phone batteries, and other rechargeables but they never made it into the bin. I hear now, anything with a screen costs money to recycle at Bestbuy. They really seem to be taking a step in the wrong direction. Better labelled bins, and easier access to recycling areas will make it easier for the average person to recycle, which in my opinion, is a net gain for us all.