Most used e-cigarettes will be discarded by consumers, excluding
them from the definition of hazardous waste at the US federal
level, as well as within the EU (US Congress, 1980b; European
Council, 1991). Under such cases, meeting the threshold for hazardous
waste lead leaching (or the presence of nicotine solution
in unused devices) would not have any regulatory implications.
States such as California, however, have not adopted the federal
US exclusion of hazardous waste for electronic products; thus any
discarded e-cigarette could potentially be a hazardous waste. In
addition, many municipalities target HHW for separate collectionand management as a hazardous waste regardless of regulatory
exclusion, and the information presented here should provide
insight to communities deciding whether to include e-cigarettes
in such programs. HHW collection events and facilities in some cases
collect both unused prescription medicines and WEEE, so it is
possible that collection of e-cigarettes could occur at these events
or locations as well. The EU promotes WEEE recycling by requiring
member states to meet WEEE recycling targets (European
Parliament, 2012). US Universal waste (UW) regulations provide
an opportunity to collect and manage items that would normally
be considered hazardous waste in a less stringent manner, providing
the wastes are recycled (US Congress, 1995); recycling operations
for e-cigarettes would be required, and given the relatively
small size and mass of these devices, this might not be feasible