Single-use vapes sparking surge in fires at UK waste plants
Disposable vapes are behind a dramatic rise in fires at recycling plants over the last year, raising the risk of a major blaze releasing toxic fumes and polluting air, industry experts warn.
Recycling firms are now dealing with so many vapes that they are struggling to insure their facilities. Some are now using artificial intelligence to detect vapes and their lithium-ion batteries, as well as installing thermal imaging cameras and automatic foam jets.
The hazardous material dealt with at waste and recycling plants means they can potentially cause fires similar to 2020’s Bradford tyre fire which burned for a week and forced 20 schools to close and required every firefighter in West Yorkshire.
Around 1.3m single-use vapes are now thrown away each week in the UK – an extraordinary rise since the first was sold in 2019 – and many are dumped by the roadside or in general waste. They contain lithium-ion batteries, which easily catch fire if broken, and some vapers have suffered life-changing injuries after theirs have exploded.
Research by Material Focus, a non-profit organisation which runs the Recycle Your Electricals campaign, found that more than 700 fires in bin lorries and recycling centres were caused by batteries that had been dumped into general waste.
Grundon, which recycles around 80,000 tonnes of household and municipal waste a year, has seen an increase in the number of disposable vapes being picked up by road sweeping vehicles, whose circular brushes usually collect leaves and stones.
“They’re sold as disposable so people just throw them on the floor,” said Owen George, division manager for Grundon. “We didn’t see any about a year or so ago, but now they’re everywhere. We probably pick out 100 to 150 on an eight-hour
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