Electronics recycling fee takes effect Feb. 1

Nova Scotians will soon be charged a recycling fee when they buy new electronics.

As of Feb. 1, consumers will pay anywhere from $5 to $45 when they buy items such as televisions and computers.

Bill Ring, CEO of the Resource Recovery Fund Board of Nova Scotia, said the fees will pay for disposal of the toxic elements in electronics after they are dropped off at recycling depots around the province.

"There's a lot of nasty stuff in electronics like mercury and lead and things like that. We want to get those out of the waste stream and make sure it's recycled in a responsible way," he said.

"The other issue is that by recycling a lot of the other components in it, you don't have to make new plastic. You can recycle the old plastic. Also, you don't have to mine new sources of metal. You can recycle the existing metal."

There are around 30 recycling depots approved to handle electronic waste across the province. Alberta, British Columbia and Saskatchewan have similar programs.

Items such as cellphones and scanners will be added to the e-recycling list in February 2009.

Nova Scotians have been recycling other waste for years.

This past year, for example, 268 million beverage containers were recycled as well as 46,000 tonnes of recyclable materials through municipal programs, according to the RRFB's annual report.