How to recycle lithium batteries in Australia

Last verified 2026-09-30

Lithium batteries don’t go in any of your household bins. Not the red one, not the yellow one. After that, for most household batteries, where it goes comes down to two questions:

1. Can you get the battery out of the device?
2. How much does it weigh?

A few kinds, like phones, laptops and car batteries, have their own schemes. Those are in the table too.

Where each kind of battery goes

A quick note on where this applies. The under-5 kg answer is the same all over Australia: B-cycle is the government-backed battery stewardship scheme, and its drop-off network runs nationwide. The answers above 5 kg, and for batteries sealed inside a device, are New South Wales arrangements, because that’s where we’re based. We’ll cover the other states properly rather than guess at them.

Before you go: getting a battery ready

This is the step people skip, and it’s the one that matters. A flat battery isn’t an empty battery. There’s enough charge left in a dead cell to throw a spark if its terminals touch something metal.

• Tape the terminals. B-cycle asks for clear sticky tape, and for the brand name and battery chemistry to stay uncovered. AA-style cells have a terminal at each end. A 9V has both at the same end. A button cell’s terminals are on the base, so cover it on all sides. A power tool pack needs every exposed metal contact covered.
• Keep them in a glass jar that isn’t airtight. Pressure can build up in a sealed one. Not a metal tin, and not loose in a drawer with the keys and coins.
• Keep them cool, dry and out of children’s reach. Away from the stove, out of the sun.
• Ring ahead if you’ve got more than about a kilogram. B-cycle asks for a call at 1 kg and caps a single drop-off at 5 kg.
• Don’t let them pile up. ALDI suggests dropping batteries off within six months, which is a sensible rule for the box in the laundry.

Finding a drop-off point

One tip makes the locators much more useful: filter by battery type. The B-cycle finder lets you narrow it down to power tool batteries, e-bike and e-scooter batteries under 5 kg, button cells and so on, so you only see the points that take what you’re actually carrying. Use the operator’s own finder rather than a general web search, and check the battery type is on its accepted list. Supermarket and hardware bins don’t all take the same things.

If the battery is damaged, swollen or hot

Then none of the above applies, and it shouldn’t go into a collection bin with other batteries. B-cycle won’t accept badly damaged, swollen or bulging batteries at its drop-off points at all. NSW Government advice is to stop using a battery like that immediately, keep it in a well-ventilated area at least 3 metres from any structure or combustible material until it can be disposed of, and contact either a B-cycle accredited collector or the NSW EPA Environment Line on 131 500. What counts as damaged, where a swollen pack can actually go, and how to keep it safe in the meantime are all on damaged, swollen or recalled batteries.

If a device is smoking or giving off flames, follow Fire and Rescue NSW’s advice, and call 000 straight away if anyone is hurt or needs urgent medical help.

Why the kerbside bin is never the answer

A battery that gets crushed in a garbage truck is a fire. In NSW, Fire and Rescue attended more than 280 incidents caused by lithium-ion batteries during 2025. Across the country, the waste industry reports an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 battery-related fires a year, in trucks, at transfer stations, and in the sorting facilities that handle what you put out on the kerb.

That’s the whole reason the drop-off network exists, and why the five-minute detour on the way to the shops is worth making.

What actually happens to it

The batteries collected at Bunnings and Woolworths go to Ecobatt. Woolworths says over 95 per cent of the materials in a battery are recovered, and the rest is mostly casings that can’t be reused yet. B-cycle says batteries are processed back into materials including plastic, nickel, steel and lithium, which go on to become metal tools, computer parts and brand new batteries.

So the trip does more than keep a battery out of a truck. The metals inside it get used again.