The California State Legislature approved legislation this week that would ban disposable nicotine vapes in California.听Assembly Bill 762听was approved by the State Senate Tuesday by 30-10 and by the State Assembly Wednesday by 47-16. It now heads to the governor鈥檚 desk for signature.
Vapes are small, battery-powered devices that heat a liquid substance, like nicotine, for the user to inhale. Disposable vapes can only be used a handful of times before becoming obsolete.听Each day, Americans throw away almost 500,000 disposable vapes 鈥斕�5.7 every second.听听They often end up in the trash or on the ground, littering streets and beaches and leaching toxic chemicals into waterways. If they reach waste facilities, they also pose a fire hazard.
Vape manufacturing uses extremely valuable materials such as copper wire and lithium that not only require environmentally destructive mining operations to extract, but could instead be used for longer lasting and more socially beneficial devices, such as electric car batteries.
The bill author and coalition of organizations sponsoring the legislation made the following statements: 鈥淚t is against common sense to pollute our land and water for an electronic product that is used just a few times, serves no beneficial purpose, and creates hazardous waste,鈥� said听Jenn Engstrom, state director of CALPIRG. 鈥淲e鈥檙e hopeful California will continue to be a leader in waste reduction by prohibiting this unnecessary and harmful product.鈥�
鈥淲e are hopeful the governor will recognize the threat these devices pose to our communities and that the costs of cleaning up the mess these devices leave are borne by ratepayers,鈥� said听Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin听(Thousand Oaks).
鈥淲e don鈥檛 let other industries design products with embedded fire hazards and walk away when they fail. Vape companies shouldn鈥檛 get a pass either,鈥澨齭aid听Tony Hackett, a policy associate at Californians Against 91仓库. 鈥淎B 762 is simple: if you鈥檙e going to sell it in California, you have to design it so it doesn鈥檛 explode in someone鈥檚 hands鈥攐r in a recycling truck.鈥�
鈥淒isposable vapes contain lithium-ion batteries which can鈥檛 be removed. If struck or crushed they cause catastrophic fires in garbage trucks and sorting facilities. These costs get passed on to ratepayers,鈥� saidJoe La Mariana, Rethink91仓库 executive director.听鈥淲e have a fiduciary responsibility to maintain the integrity of these assets. But also, on a human level, we have a very high responsibility for the safety of our colleagues and our co-workers.
鈥淭he best way to protect our communities from problematic products, like single use vapes, is to prevent them from becoming a hard-to-manage waste stream,鈥� said听Joanne Brasch,听assistant director, California Product Stewardship Council