Call for more vapes to be recycled

County Durham now has 150 boxes in place to recycle small electrical items.

Bright pink vape recycling bins have been installed across County Durham to encourage people not to litter or send them to landfill.

The 36 bins can be found in libraries, leisure centres and venues and sit alongside 150 recycling points for small electrical items.

Not-for-profit organisation Material Focus provided £100,000 to support the project through the Recycle Your Electricals campaign.

Repair cafes will also tour the county offering advice on repairing and reusing items.

HypnoCat aims to hypnotise local residents into recycling their electricals.

Councillor Mark Wilkes said: "It isn’t safe to dispose of used vapes at home and we ask people not to put them in their bins because lithium batteries are highly flammable, explosive and polluting."

Research by Recycle Your Electricals found 39% of people bin electricals rather than recycle them, in the belief it is simply too hard to recycle.

Information about the scheme is being provided through leaflets and on posters featuring a pink fluffy mascot called HypnoCat.