Fire and ‘sheer volume’: how Britain’s 6m-vape problem is putting recycling under strain

I t is 2pm and Ana, 47, has just started the afternoon shift at the Suez recycling plant near Birmingham city centre, standing beneath a sign reading “Non-ferrous sorting station” with a bucket of vapes in front of her. Sorting and dismantling them is part of her job as a site operative. Recycling them is not simple. Each bucket holds between 40 and 50 devices, and over the course of a shift, she gets through about half a bucket. Using a hammer, she has to smash each vape open, pry out the batteries and separate each component into a different container. Single-use vapes were banned in June last year, but more than 6m vapes and vape pods are still being discarded every week in the UK. Waste management companies say the sheer volume is straining recycling systems, while hidden lithium-ion batteries inside the devices are causing fires. As Ana works, a burst of sugary scent fills the air; she doesn’t worry about the vapes exploding, she says, it’s never happened to her yet. But while vapes may not be hazardous at this stage of the sorting, they can become dangerous when crushed or damaged, such as during waste collection and storage. Suez says vapes are suspected as the cause of more than 80% of the reported fires at its sites last year. Photograph: Fabio De Paola/The Guardian In 2025, there were 670 fires at Suez’s UK sites. Of those, 368 were confirmed to be caused by batteries or vapes, with a further 176 suspected to be linked. …