Give Your Pocketbook and the Environment a Break!

As television sound engineers for decades, we used battery powered mixers, cabled microphones, wireless microphones, intercom transmitters, cameras, portable lights– on and on the list goes. Hundreds of batteries. Hundreds of batteries I used every… year. As a business owner, battery cost was significant in expenses.

Being a responsible citizen, I decided to save up a significant number of discharged AA, 9volt alkaline and lithium batteries and take them to the local public toxic waste dump site to dispose of them. After 18 months of saving up the discharged batteries I took them to the public toxic waste disposal site in the San Francisco Bay Area. The people at the toxic waste dump site wanted me to fill out all this paperwork with massive amounts of personal information before they’d take my discharged batteries.

I stood there and realized they were asking too much of me. They wanted to know all about my personal life. I had absolutely nothing to hide, but realized I was not really willing to give these individuals at the toxic waste site all my personal data. They would not budge. It was their policy to take detailed information on the people who made a deposit. So, I hate to say it, but I kept the batteries and threw them away. I had a box 3/4 the size of an apple box full of 9 volt alkaline and lithium batteries, along with several AA alkaline batteries. It was against my conscience to do this, but I could not go against my conscience and give my personal information out so freely.

That was 10 years ago, and the world of batteries has changed drastically. With the chemical makeup of the newer batteries, a person can re-use rechargeable 9 volt batteries or rechargeable AA batteries. After they have been used up to hundreds of times, they can be disposed of in the garbage and not cause environmental havoc. It still is always a good idea to recycle them, and it is easier to do it now. Many electronic stores offer recycle depositories at their locations.
One great place to recycle batteries of many kinds is at your local Radio Shack. Here is what the display looks like. They recycle them easily and provide a great service to the public.

Even though the rechargeable batteries do not have the toxic chemicals and metals the alkaline batteries do, they all need to be recycled to keep the landscape clean and safe.

Radio Shack is doing its part to make it possible for us to be more responsible as the demand for portable power grows.

Thank you Radio Shack!

Check back November 1st and we will be launching a product line of rechargeable products that may make your Christmas Shopping new and exciting by offering time and money saving technology in reusable power for your family and friends.