skip to main content
skip to newscasts

Friday, March 29, 2024

Public News Service Logo
facebook instagram linkedin reddit youtube twitter
view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

The latest on the Key Bridge collapse, New York puts forth legislation to get clean energy projects on the grid and Wisconsin and other states join a federal summer food program to help feed kids across the country.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Republicans float conspiracy theories on the collapse of Baltimore's Key Bridge, South Carolina's congressional elections will use a map ruled unconstitutional, and the Senate schedules an impeachment trial for Homeland Secretary Mayorkas.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Keeping Lead out of Wisconsin Landfills and Waterways

play audio
Play

Friday, March 21, 2014   

MADISON, Wis. – Earlier this week, a bill to double the deposit on lead batteries to up to $10 passed the full Assembly and is now headed to Gov. Scott Walker's desk for his signature.

Lead is a poisonous substance that can damage the nervous system and cause blood and brain disorders.

For years, Wisconsin has had a program to properly recycle lead batteries – the kind found in cars, trucks, garden tractors, snowmobiles and so on. This helps to keep lead out of landfills and waterways.

Jennifer Giegerich, legislative director of the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters, says her group pushed hard for the bill's passage, which will help keep the recycling program financially stable.

"The League of Conservation Voters supports Senate Bill 512 because it helps to update a statute that allows us to keep lead batteries out of landfills," she adds.

The existing law requires establishments that sell lead batteries to take them back from consumers in order to keep the batteries out of landfills by properly recycling them. It caps the deposit at $5.

This new law will allow businesses to charge a deposit of up to $10.

Giegerich says the $5 deposit limit no longer reflects the actual cost of running the lead battery-recycling program, which she calls essential to keeping the lead from the batteries out of landfills and waterways.

She says state law prohibits disposing of lead batteries by dumping them in landfills or by burning them, which can release the lead into the atmosphere.

"It's especially bad for children whose brains are still developing,” she explains. “So, this is a great idea that just needed to be updated to reflect the cost of keeping those batteries out of the landfills today."

Lead is particularly dangerous, because once it gets into a person's system, it becomes distributed through the entire body, and can cause harm wherever it is in the body.

When it gets into bones, it interferes with the production of red blood cells and the absorption of calcium, which bones need to grow strong.

According to experts, up to 97 percent of a lead battery is recyclable.





get more stories like this via email

more stories
The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments this week about the popular abortion pill Mifepristone and will weigh in on whether the U.S. Food and Drug Administration was correct in how it can be dosed and prescribed. (Ascannio/Adobe Stock)

Health and Wellness

play sound

Missouri residents are worried about future access to birth control. The latest survey from The Right Time, an initiative based in Missouri…


Social Issues

play sound

Wisconsin children from low-income families are now on track to get nutritious foods over the summer. Federal officials have approved the Badger …

Social Issues

play sound

Almost 2,900 people are unsheltered on any given night in the Beehive State. Gov. Spencer Cox is celebrating signing nine bills he says are geared …


The U.S. teaching workforce remains primarily white while the percentage of Black teachers has declined. However, the percentage of Asian and Latinx teachers is rising.(WavebreakMediaMicro/Adobestock)

Social Issues

play sound

Education advocates are calling on lawmakers to increase funding for programs to combat the teacher shortage. Around 37% of schools nationwide …

Environment

play sound

New York's Legislature is considering a bill to get clean-energy projects connected to the grid faster. It's called the RAPID Act, for "Renewable …

Social Issues

play sound

Earlier this month, a new Arizona Public Service rate hike went into effect and one senior advocacy group said those on a fixed income may struggle …

Social Issues

play sound

Michigan recently implemented a significant juvenile justice reform package following recommendations from a task force made up of prosecutors…

 

Phone: 303.448.9105 Toll Free: 888.891.9416 Fax: 208.247.1830 Your trusted member- and audience-supported news source since 1996 Copyright © 2021