October 17, 2025: Illegal lead acid battery recycling in low-income countries — including Asian battery tiger China — is fuelling global lead exposure, according to a new academic study.
In China alone, it has been estimated that 30%-40% of lead batteries are recycled illegally, said the study led by Chen Mengli, a research fellow from the Tropical Marine Science Institute at the National University of Singapore — in collaboration with researchers from international institutions including Imperial College London and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
However, the study acknowledges that increased, regulated recycling of lead batteries, is managing the process sustainably and key to preventing lead exposure.
According to the study published in the journal ‘Communications Earth & Environment’ on September 30, which cited a number sources, inadequate and illegal reprocessing practices are of great concern and particularly prevalent in low-and-middle-income-countries (LMICs).
“In Bangladesh, Pure Earth, a non-governmental organization working on identifying, cleaning up, and preventing pollution in LMICs, identified more than 300 informal LAB recycling sites and expect many more that remain undocumented.”
Other cases of lead poisoning linked to inadequate recycling over the past decade have also been reported in Senegal, India and Vietnam, the study claimed.
The researchers estimated that ongoing childhood lead exposure costs add up to more than $3.4 trillion in lost economic potential each year, with disproportionate impacts on LMICs.
Meanwhile, bans on leaded gasoline to reduce blood lead levels in many countries, implying that global environmental challenges can be dealt with when there is willingness, have created the false impression that the problems of environmental lead and subsequent human exposure have been resolved, the study said.
Batteries International reported in 2020 that a global alliance of lead and battery associations had condemned all informal lead battery recycling.
The alliance, comprising the International Lead Association, EUROBAT, Battery Council International and the Association of Battery Recyclers, urged governments to do more to crack down on illegal recycling and provide incentives to ensure recycling of used batteries was only done by high performing recyclers.
Earlier this year, battery industry leaders were told that US lead battery recyclers’ total lead emissions to air accounted for less than 1% of total air lead emissions nationally.
Updates on stringent practices involved in the sector were included in the latest semi-annual meeting of the Association of Battery Recyclers — which featured an environmental panel on best practices for emissions control.
The study is available in full online.
