When a lithium-ion battery is crushed, internal short circuits create heat inside the battery too quickly to be released. This leads to overheating and eventually, a chemical reaction called thermal runaway, which starts fires.

Despite an expansion of its recycling program in 2022, the Iowa City landfill has experienced a troubling uptick in battery-related fires with five instances in fiscal year 2024 according to Resource Management Superintendent Jennifer Jordan.

Jordan said she is worried about the uptick in fires, considering they had no fires the fiscal 2023. When batteries find their way into the landfill, there is not much to do at that point to prevent fires from starting Jordan said.

“They’re so small we don’t see them,” Jordan said. “If large equipment, like a 20-ton compactor, runs over a battery, it’s going to crush that battery and start a fire. There’s a chemical reaction that takes place from that.”

She said the landfill had a close call just two weeks ago when a cell phone was run over. As the smoke built, an employee acted swiftly by getting out of the equipment, but she said the fire had put itself out before it could grow out of hand.

“It could happen all the time and we don’t always see it. So, it’s really important to help people understand that anything that has a battery in it should not go into the landfill,” Jordan said.

Jordan said the landfill recycled over 10,000 pounds of batteries in 2023. Jane Wilch, the recycling coordinator for Iowa City, mentioned the city has taken strides to expand drop-off locations for residents to dispose of their unwanted or old batteries.

“We’ve tried to diversify the location to make it as easy as possible to get those batteries safely and promptly where they need to be. They even go beyond Iowa City,” Wilch said.

The Iowa City government website provides information about how and where to dispose of batteries for residents of Johnson County.

“The reason that we do have this in a drop-off-like structure is because [batteries] are a recyclable material, but they’re a different type of material. They’ve got hazardous material in them, and so because of that, we have to handle them in a special way,” Wilch said.

Iowa City collaborates with Call2Recycle, a nonprofit organization whose goal is to ensure proper battery recycling by providing a comprehensive program.

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Vice President of Services & Solutions Todd Ellis of Call2Recycle Iowa has 263 active collection sites. These sites are located in national retailers like Lowe’s, Home Depot, and Staples, Ellis said. Call2Recycle also takes safety precautions for their drop-off sites.

“Each box has a fire-retardant line around the inside. Certainly, our goal is to capture as many batteries as we can, but we can’t do that without taking safety into consideration,” Ellis said.

Call2Recycle works with 230 manufacturers of batteries and products that are powered by them to keep them in compliance with the Extended Producer Responsibility, or EPR, Ellis said. The organization also acts as a stewardship for battery recycling across the country.

“I think from an environmental perspective, it’s super important to divert batteries from landfills and incinerators, to have those recycled and be able to reuse and recapture those elemental metals,” Ellis said.

Jordan emphasized the constant danger faced by landfill workers due to battery-related fires and the importance of residents knowing the proper way to dispose of them.

“Even the small fires are terrifying, and staff are in jeopardy every time,” Jordan said.