Abstract
The amount of waste portable batteries has been increasing, and a large amount of various metals in them may lead to resource depletion and water pollution if they are not appropriately recycled or disposed. In order to identify batteries and metals that should be assessed in further detail for their effective collection and recycling, we evaluated the resource consumption and water pollution potentials of 36 metals from five types of batteries in Japan, by measuring the amount of metals contained in and leached from the waste batteries and calculating three screening indices. The evaluation method was designed to have wide applicability to many batteries and metals based on its importance in screening during the first stage of waste product management. The results showed that we should give the first priority for detailed assessments to cadmium in nickel-cadmium batteries because all of its indices are the highest. Likewise, compared with the metals in nickel-hydride batteries and lithium-ion batteries that are obliged to be collected and recycled by law, the second priority should be given to zinc and manganese in manganese batteries and alkaline batteries, which are treated as non combustible garbage, with regard to resource consumption and conservation of the aquatic biota.
