I was recently surfing the net and became a little curious about rechargable batteries. The reason I became curious about rechargables is because I received a set of rechargable batteries along with a charger for Christmas. Since I had a large pack of regular AA alkaline batteries, I just recently pulled out the rechargables and began using them.
When I received the batteries, I thought they were NiCd rechargables which do not hold a charge for very long, and are toxic (nickel-cadmium contains toxic metals). Of course, I'm a little biased because I came from an era when the rechargable alkaline battery was just becoming commercially available, and were considered superior than the NiCd rechargables. For a little bit of information about NiCd batteries, visit http://www.batteryuniversity.com/partone-4.htm and for general information about batteries, visit the "What's the Best Battery" article at http://www.batteryuniversity.com/partone-3.htm
For general information about "environmentally friendly" rechargable batteries, you might also be interested in visiting http://www.greenbatteries.com/index.html
Anyway....
I was wrong about the batteries I was given for Christmas. They weren't the NiCd batteries I was dreading, they were NiMH batteries. Apparently this is a relatively newer technology. The batteries are far less toxic than NiCd and they hold a charge longer. I'm testing them now in my CD/MP3 player, and they seem to work just fine. I still have a boat load of standard alkaline AA batteries because I was at the store recently, knew I was running out of batteries, and had forgotten that I had the rechargables. I now have an economy pack of standard AA alkaline batteries sitting in my fridge (Alkaline batteries keep their charge longer when they are not in use if they are kept cold.)
Even though I'm toying with the rechargables now, I'm sure I'll finish off the package of disposable batteries that I bought before I really get in to using the rechargables again.
Since batteries are toxic, I thought I'd include a little blurb on that topic that I found at http://www.grinningplanet.com/2004/12-21/battery-recycling-article.htm
-----Begin Blurb-----
"There are many types of consumer batteries, from the lead-acid batteries we use in our cars to the little button batteries in our watches. There are household batteries like AA, AAA, C, D and 9-volt, some of them rechargeable, some not. But whatever type of battery, they all have chemicals inside them.
Of course, chemicals are not all equally toxic. The three worst "baddies" in batteryland are:
- lead,
- cadmium, and
- mercury
Other battery compounds like silver, zinc, and nickel can also be problems, but less so.
Sending any type of battery to the landfill or incinerator means the contents of the battery will ultimately end up getting into the soil, air, groundwater, and/or surface water, and thus eventually into the food chain and drinking-water supply. Thus, the key thing is to make sure batteries with toxic components do not go to the landfill or incinerator in the first place."
-----End Blurb-----I'm sure you can probably see where I am going with this after that little tidbit. When I was doing my digging on the net last night, I found that there are many locations that accept spent rechargable batteries, and recycle them. These locations include national retail chains like Radio Shack and Target. Chances are, you probably won't even have to go out of your way to take spent batteries to a drop off location. You can find information about a rechargable battery recycling program at http://www.call2recycle.org/ This site includes a section to heHowever, I like it when things are easy.
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