UK waste battery collection and recycling company G & P Batteries (G & P) has announced that it now has the capacity to sort around three million non-lead acid battery cells per week due to improvements made to its automated sorting system.
The automated sorting line was originally installed in 2012, and now G & P has worked with the system’s developer, Refind Technologies, to make further modifications. According to a statement from G & P, it is now a completely new model that takes up a much smaller footprint yet has doubled its capacity to handle non-lead acid batteries.
G & P says it is designed to recognise and separate the most common battery brands and chemistries. The optical system uses a camera to captures images of the batteries as they pass along the belt to identify each by label, comparing them to specimens that have been previously sorted. Air jets are then used to send different types of batteries into different containers.
The company expects to be able to deal with the increased volume of portable waste batteries in light of the UK’s 2014 target to collect 35 per cent of batteries placed on the market for recycling (an increase of five per cent from last year).
‘Ground-breaking technology’
Michael Green, G & P’s Managing Director, said: “The vast majority of the volumes handled come from the most common brands and the original system streamlined out sorting process and significantly increased the volumes we could handle.
“As the first company to install this ground-breaking technology, we have been in an ideal position to work closely with Refind Technologies to improve and refine the system and this new version has doubled our capacity.
“Whilst we will always require the expertise of manual sorters, for their experience in accurately identifying the lesser known batter brands and chemistries, the systems developed by Refind Technologies continue to make a positive impact on our business efficiency.”
Speaking of G & P, Hans Eric Mellin, CEO of Refind Technologies, added: “With collection volumes rising across Europe it is thanks to G & P that we now have efficient solutions to take care of the waste batteries, providing a major environmental benefit as well as helping to meet recycling targets.”
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