In short
Everywhere else on this site, damaged cells are the exception. In recycling they are the input. That inverts the whole problem: quarantine is not a contingency arrangement here, it is a core process, and the cells that cause fires are usually the ones nobody knew were in the load.
The hidden-cell problem
A pack that arrives labelled as a battery gets handled as one. The fires tend to start with cells that arrived inside something else: a vape, a greetings card, a power bank in a bag of mixed WEEE, a cordless tool in a skip. By the time they reach a baler or a shredder they are damaged by definition.
That means the controls that work in other sectors — approved procurement, an approved charger list — have almost no purchase here. Yours are detection, segregation and the speed with which a suspect item gets out of the process.
Where the regulations bite differently
The Waste Batteries and Accumulators Regulations 2009 are the framework, not an afterthought. Alongside the general duties in UK law on storing lithium-ion batteries at work, you are also likely to be moving damaged cells between sites — and damaged lithium batteries attract stricter dangerous goods requirements in transport than healthy ones. That is a separate compliance question worth confirming with your carrier rather than assuming.
What to build
- A defined quarantine location, sized for a bad week rather than an average one. The failure mode is a full quarantine store and a damaged pack with nowhere to go, so it ends up beside the loading door.
- Separation from the processing line and from stored material. Ideally external. Distance is the control that does not fail.
- Detection that reports somewhere staffed. Cells vent gas before they flame, so gas detection buys real time — see what causes thermal runaway.
- A picking instruction, not a policy document. Staff on the line need to know what a suspect item looks like and exactly what to do with it in the next thirty seconds.
- Thermal monitoring of stored material where volumes justify it. A fire that has already started inside a bale is a different event from one you catch at the picking stage.
- A conversation with the fire service in advance. They will want to know what is stored, where, and how much water it will take.
Containment for quarantine is one of the few places where a cabinet is genuinely near the top of the list rather than the bottom — because here you are storing items you already know are compromised. See battery cabinets.
Frequently asked questions
Can damaged cells go in the same store as sound waste batteries?
No. A damaged pack has a materially higher chance of failing, and putting it with sound stock means its failure takes the stock with it. Separate the two physically, and treat anything swollen, deformed, heat-affected or water-affected as damaged even if it looks serviceable.
How long can we hold damaged cells before collection?
Your permit and your waste contractor set the limits, so check both rather than working to a general figure. Practically, the shorter the better: a damaged cell can fail days or weeks after the damage occurred, so holding time is exposure. Size the quarantine store around your actual collection interval and then argue for a shorter one.
Is there any way to find hidden cells before they reach the process?
Not reliably, which is the honest answer. Operators use a mix of pre-sort picking, staff training on what to look for, and in some cases detection technology on the line. None of it catches everything, so the design assumption should be that some cells will get through — which is why detection and suppression on stored material matter as much as picking does.