In a Puff of Smoke?

Emma Snaith had great difficulty, when trying to recycle a single 'disposable' e-cigarette or vape (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/03/recycle-disposable-vape-single-use-e-cigarettes-lithium). E-cigarettes are complex combinations of plastics, fluids and electronics. They consequently don't lend themselves to easy disposal. In the UK, 1.3 million of such single-use vapes are jettisoned each week. Fifty percent of these, are simply thrown away. Retailers selling £100,000 of these devices, are said to be 'required' to operate a 'take-back scheme' for disposal. None of the people in stores, questioned by Snaith, seemed to be aware of this. Most vape users are actually unlikely to travel distances to specialist disposal points, even when these exist. Most users, consequently appear to simply drop their 'disposable' vape, when it 'runs out'. This may obviously result in dangerous metals, battery acid and nicotine leaching into the environment. Fires may even be caused, if the lithium batteries are punctured. Each battery, in a 'disposable' vape, contains circa 0.15g of lithium. Snaith points out that, consequently, enough valuable lithium is thrown away in the UK each year, to manufacture 1,200 batteries for electric cars. This, and the large amounts of water and energy used to produce 'disposable' vapes, makes this a very wasteful and environmentally-damaging process. 'Disposable' vapes could be banned (as in Australia) or any store that sells them could be actually forced to operate a drop-off point for their return. Banning seems easier and more likely to eliminate vape waste. Currently, the rich vendors of a legal but highly addictive drug,'get away with murder', in the UK.