Positively Green

The Audiology team at UHP are leading the way in sustainable change with their recent approved switch to rechargeable hearing aid batteries. This innovative investment will hugely reduce the waste, expenditure and CO₂ emissions of the department!

UHP purchases around 400,000 hearing aid batteries per year- at the end of their life these are then either recycled or thrown away in domestic waste streams, the latter of which can be dangerous; once incinerated or released into landfills, these batteries can leak hazardous chemicals, contaminating the environment and affecting air and water quality. With this new switch to rechargeable hearing aids, eventually UHP’s audiology patients won’t need to throw away their hearing aid batteries which will completely eliminate this waste. It is worth pointing out that this waste elimination will take some time as the department fits thousands of aids per year, and hearing aids have a life of three-five years, so it will take a significant time for everyone to be seen.

The manufacturer’s external audit of the life cycle of these devices shows a carbon footprint of around 25% of the non-rechargeable models:

standard pair of aids - lifetime 12.38 kgCO₂eq

rechargeable pair of aids - lifetime 3.29 kgCO₂eq

Certainly a win, but this blog on the GreenMatch website makes an important point: while rechargeable batteries offer a more sustainable alternative to disposable batteries, their use and disposal requires consumer commitment. A study by the Polytechnic Institute of Milan found that a rechargeable battery needs to be charged about 50 times to offset its environmental impact. This means that, to truly benefit the environment, users must be dedicated to using them regularly and ensuring they are properly recycled at the end of their life. As long as they are using their hearing aids, and return them to the department at the end of their life, then these benefits will be realised.

As explained on the Carbon Literacy Project website, like all electronic devices, hearing aids have a carbon footprint associated with their production, usage, and disposal. The annual carbon footprint for an individual bilateral hearing aid user ranges from 10-20 kg CO₂e - equivalent to 25-50 miles driven in a car. This may seem minimal in isolation. However, when added up, the total annual direct carbon footprint of the hearing aid industry is between 100- 150 thousand tonnes CO₂e - equivalent to 250-375 million miles driven in a car. These statistics demonstrate how sustainable changes in audiology departments are so valuable to decarbonisation plans. We’re beyond proud of our Audiology department and their fantastic achievement in the name of reduced environmental impact!