Southern states recycle more than Northern

Call2Recycle® announced that battery recycling is on the rise, although the increase is coming from surprising places. While the increase – up more than 8 percent so far this year over 2009 – demonstrates that Americans are recycling more, the states with the highest increase are all in the south, a region that traditionally is slow to adopt sustainability programs. States such as California, Minnesota and Vermont, that are typically green leaders, have dipped battery recycling.

So far in 2010, Call2Recycle has seen the largest increases in battery recycling from South Carolina (99 percent increase), Kentucky (59 percent increase), Arkansas (55 percent increase), North Carolina (53 percent) and Mississippi (49 percent increase). During the same period of time, battery recycling has decreased by 7 percent in California, 25 percent in Minnesota and 3 percent in Vermont.

So far this year, battery collections from retail partners are up by only 2.6 percent nationwide, while industries such as healthcare, higher education and military installments have experienced much larger increases due to an emphasis on sustainability initiatives in day-to-day operations.