This holiday season many of us will be buying and receiving new electronics, including cell phones, digital cameras, camcorders and power tools. Many times these new electronics are replacing an old or broken one, and batteries that end up in landfills can leach heavy metals, lead, and acid into the environment.

In landfills, heavy metals have the potential to leach slowly into soil, groundwater or surface water. Dry cell batteries contribute about 88 percent of the total mercury and 50 percent of the cadmium in the municipal solid waste stream. In the past, batteries accounted for nearly half of the mercury used in the United States and over half of the mercury and cadmium in the municipal solid waste stream. When burned, some heavy metals such as mercury may vaporize and escape into the air, and cadmium and lead may end up in the ash.

You can make your holidays a little greener by recycling the old batteries from your electronics and encouraging friends and family to do the same. The best part about it (besides helping out the environment) is that it is free!

Call2Recycle is a non-profit organization that collects rechargeable batteries and cell phones for recycling. The company refurbishes batteries and cell phones for reuse or salvages materials from them for use in new stainless steel products and batteries. Call2Recycle claims that “none of the material broken down from the recycling of rechargeable batteries and cell phones makes its ways into the landfills.”

If you have old cell phones to recycle, it's best to go ahead and erase personal data before passing them on to any charitable organization. Sites like this one can show you how.

Call2Recycle can use batteries from products as diverse as:

• Digital cameras


• Camcorders


• PDAs


• Cordless power tools


• Laptop computers


• Cordless phones


• Portable printers


• Two-way radios

They accept the following types of batteries:

• Nickel Cadmium (Ni-Cd)


• Nickel Metal Hydrid (Ni-MH)


• Lithium Ion (Li-ion)


• Nickel Zinc (Ni-Zn)


• Small Sealed Lead (Pb) batteries weighing up to 2lbs each

They do not take alkaline, non-rechargeable or lithium batteries.

Drop your batteries off at one of the many collection sites including Target stores, Office Depot, Best Buy, Home Depot, Lowes and Sears. You can find a complete list on their website or call their toll free number 877-2-RECYCLE. Instead of making a dedicated trip and wasting gas, save the batteries for your next trip to one of the participating stores.

So this holiday season, keep batteries and cell phones out of the landfill and help educate your friends and family by telling them about the Call2Recycle program!