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NPEP Success Story
Alcatel-Lucent Collects and Recycles Lead-Acid Batteries
Lucent Technologies was spun off by AT&T on Sept. 30, 1996, but its history dates back to 1869 when Elisha Gray and Enos N. Barton formed a small manufacturing firm based in Cleveland. Three years later the firm, which by then was located in Chicago, was renamed the Western Electric Manufacturing Company. Alcatel’s origins date back to 1898 when French engineer Pierre Azaria set up “La Compagnie Générale d'Electricité (CGE).” CGE was a French-based industrial conglomerate involved in various activities such as electricity, transportation, electronics and telecommunications. In 2006, facing an industry where operators were consolidating and ever-intense competition, Alcatel and Lucent Technologies announced plans to merge. Alcatel-Lucent provides solutions that enable service providers, enterprises and governments worldwide, to deliver voice, data and video communication services to end-users.
Alcatel-Lucent’s NPEP Goal
Lucent Technologies (now Alcatel-Lucent) enrolled in NPEP in July, 2005 and set a three year corporate goal to collect and recycle lead-acid batteries from facility operations and customers in the United States ensuring that these materials do not enter the waste stream, with lead being remanufactured back into new lead-acid batteries. The revised goal was to reclaim the equivalent of 500,000 pounds of lead contained within lead-acid batteries in calendar year 2005, 1,000,000 pounds of lead in 2006 and 500,000 pounds of lead in 2007. The combined three-year goal was to reclaim 2,000,000 pounds of lead, a goal that we were able to achieve.
NPEP Project Implementation
Lucent Technologies has always recycled lead-acid batteries generated by facility operations to ensure that lead is managed in an environmentally responsible manner. In 2005, Lucent Technologies was contracted by network telecommunication service providers (customers) to recycle their lead-acid storage batteries from locations, such as network switching centers and wireless cellular sites in the U.S. These batteries are typically used in central offices and other locations within the service providers’ telecommunication networks to provide back-up/emergency power to their systems during power interruptions/outages ensuring that in emergency situations, the networks can continue to operate and support, for example, public service needs such as 911 services. Alcatel-Lucent has established a battery maintenance, installation, removal, transportation and recycling program across the US, in partnership with our customers to ensure that these batteries are properly managed and recycled, ensuring that they cost effectively meet legal requirements. The batteries are transported to centralized locations until truckload quantities are accumulated for shipment to licensed battery recycling facilities.
Hurdles Faced & Lessons Learned
-- One hurdle was ensuring that installers received the training required for regulatory compliance associated with proper handling and transportation of the lead-acid batteries. Installers received training by Alcatel-Lucent’s regional EH&S professionals and intranet based courses.
-- The program emphasized the effectiveness of centralized project management for the transportation and accumulation of truck load quantities of lead-acid batteries and centralized procurement for lead-acid battery recycling.
-- Company and customer liability was minimized through the use of only licensed lead-acid battery recycling facilities in the continental U.S. that were approved by Alcatel-Lucent’s Corporate EH&S Office.
-- Alcatel-Lucent assured proper handling and recycling of not only lead, but also other materials associated with the lead-acid batteries (i.e., plastic and sulfuric acid). By recycling the battery components, Alcatel-Lucent reduced its cost for managing the waste. The revenue from the recovery of more than 2,000,000 pounds of lead helped to fund the collection, transportation and accumulation of the lead-acid batteries.
-- The ability to report on the success in meeting the NPEP goal provides further testimony to our commitment to corporate social responsibility and to our commitment to provide the highest level of service to our customers and our desire to continue our partnership with the US EPA.
Waste Minimization Results
In 2005, Lucent Technologies collected and recycled 1,141,100 pounds of lead-acid batteries resulting in the recovery of 821,500 pounds of lead. In 2006, Lucent Technologies collected and recycled 1,221,900 pounds of lead-acid batteries resulting in the recovery of 928,200 pounds of lead. In 2007, Alcatel-Lucent collected and recycled 441,400 pounds of lead-acid batteries resulting in the recovery of 309,000 pounds of lead. The three-year effort exceeded our goal and resulted in the collection and recycling of 2,804,400 pounds of lead-acid batteries, which resulted in the recovery of 2,058,700 pounds of lead.