Disposable Vapes: The New Litter Problem Schools Are Facing

Littering in and around schools and colleges has always been an issue, but it can slowly improve as pupils and students gradually learn to respect their environment. The arrival of vaping adds a new threat and dimension to the problem, with the risk of fires and pollution added to typical risks from food, drinks and other sources of litter.

Whatever the types of waste, learning about how the damage it causes and how to deal with it correctly is key to empowering students to make more responsible choices around disposal.

What are the Risks of Vaping Litter?

The primary risk from vapes comes from the lithium batteries that generate the heat inside the vape, and the chemicals that are used in the vape liquid to create the smoke. Between them, these are a fire and chemical hazard. In schools that risk is multiplied as younger people are more interested and likely to pick them up and play with them.

What makes vapes worse is the huge number of illegal vapes sold to youngsters that have low quality components. These components increase the risk of fire, pollution and injury, beyond the risk of nicotine addiction among pupils and students.

A ban on disposable vapes will help when it comes into force in June 2025, reducing the problem, but schools can use school vape detectors to identify trouble spots and act to reduce littering.

Food and Drink Still Dominate the Litter Landscape

Food and drink litter remains one of the most common type of litter around secondary schools and colleges. Part-eaten food along with its packaging attracts rodents, foxes and other animals onto school premises, with their unpleasant scat and urine adding a messy byproduct that can add to the risk of illness, and creates unpleasant smells.

Packaging and bottles can also trap or ensnare animals, creating distressing scenes, while bottle tops and smaller food-tainted waste can be ingested by birds and other animals, injuring or killing them.

Plastic Waste Continues to Grow

The long-term damage from plastic waste affects every part of the country, including schools and colleges, where it can blow into the streets, hedgerows or sewers or end up in the rivers and seas.

The Ocean Cleanup project provides both a harrowing and exciting view into the build up of plastic waste, and the interconnected ways that it spreads and accumulates, while the Ocean Wise youth programs provide educational resources about the problem.

Schools can use plastic waste as the focus of their recycling efforts, explaining the different types of plastics, how they should be disposed of, and the chemistry that went into their creation, along with the long-term damage they can do to the environment if not disposed of correctly.

Electronic Waste is A Growing Problem for Schools

Typically, schools keep hold of their electronics until they are well past their sell by date, while pupils bring in all kinds of gadgets from phones to advanced headphones, charging packs and speakers. The increasingly disposable nature of gadgets make them a risk around schools, with the leakage and fire hazard from batteries to the choking hazards of cables and wiring among younger children.

Teaching pupils the rules about rules such as the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) regulations, will help them understand why gadgets must be donated, recycled or disposed of properly. Encouraging science pupils to understand the nature of modern Lithium-Ion batteries and other technologies will also help them learn about the risks from a chemical perspective, while schools can use their legal waste disposal methods of eWaste as an example to pupils.

Waste Education is Vital For All

Whatever the type of waste, all students need to be educated about the risks of waste, and why it needs to be sorted in the appropriate bins to encourage recycling and prevent accidents.

Schemes like Bristol’s Big Tidy or Bournemouth’s Beach Clean are just a couple of examples of efforts where schools can get involved. They help with the education process and encourage pupils to keep their schools and streets litter free, while helping solve an immediate part of the litter problem through these key steps:

• Take litter home where possible
• Learn which items go in the right bins
• How to reuse, recycle and reduce usage
• Understand how litter impacts your local and global ecosystems
• Educate the young so they can teach others

Through these schemes, teaching our young about the problems with waste and the need to bin, recycle and manage waste properly will help the country deal with the issue, and ensure a cleaner, greener future for us all.