Media Release, 9th December 2025
Recycling old and broken tech, such as festive favourite fairy lights, is one of the most impactful sustainable actions you can take in December and January. As binned battery-powered fairy lights alone stretch to the equivalent of just over 7 Santa trips around the globe, this Christmas, help stop the increase in battery fires in bin lorries and get recycling.
New research from the Recycle Your Electricals campaign, has revealed that an incredible £1.7b was spent on 183m FastTech (cheap) Christmas lights (and the batteries for them!) ahead of Christmas. But whilst these lights brighten the winter months during the solstice, there’s a challenging side too. The reality is, that as quickly as we buy our festive lights, we are almost as quickly binning them. Over a year, 168m light-up items and FastTech gifts ended up in the bin, causing hundreds of battery fires across the UK.
As a nation, it’s clear we can’t get enough of twinkly lights come December, but research has revealed the impact of these lights – many contain batteries that when binned or incorrectly recycled are behind the surge of fires in the waste stream. This Christmas, Recycle Your Electricals is calling on the nation to help prevent these fires by instead recycling broken and unwanted lights, batteries and other FastTech Christmas gifts.
Christmas lights in particular signal the entry into the merriest of seasons, a love so strong we bought the equivalent of six light-up items a second ahead of last Christmas – from 39m Christmas fairy lights to a variety of novelty light-up items, including stars and wreaths, snow globes and reindeer. They adorn our homes, our gardens, our living spaces and spread Christmas cheer.
Many FastTech or light-up electrical items are powered by batteries which, if they end up in the wrong bin, get crushed and damaged in bin and recycling lorries and spark dangerous fires that put firefighters, waste workers and the communities we live in at serious risk. There were over 1,200 battery fires during 2023-24 in bins and waste centres, an increase of 71% from 2022 – with many taking place in bin lorries, waste centres and recycling centres as a result of batteries and electricals being binned or incorrectly recycled. Earlier research from Recycle Your Electricals has found that 1.1b of all types of electricals and 449.9m loose volatile batteries have been binned – each a potential fire waiting to happen.
These fires are extremely challenging, often leading to explosions and chemical exposure, as they create their own oxygen, which means they can keep reigniting, prolonging incidents with smoke and fumes affecting neighbouring areas and communities for long periods of time.
Scott Butler, Executive Director, Material Focus, which runs the Recycle Your Electricals campaign, says, “We’re not the Grinch. We also find twinkly lights irresistible at Christmas. We understand FastTech Christmas lights and gifts, and the traditions around them, help make Christmas the most joyful time of year for many. But as we reach the new year the novelty’s worn off or the festive lights have broken yet again, why not start 2026 by creating your own positive impact? If it can’t be fixed, donated or sold, always recycle them. Electricals with hidden batteries must always be recycled separately from your household rubbish and recycling. Visit our Recycling Locator, to find your nearest recycling point where you’ll find how quick and easy it is to make sure tech doesn’t end up in the bin.”
And as we approach the busiest time of year for our waste and fire services, many of whom also work on Christmas Day, Recycle Your Electricals wants to celebrate the Unsung Heroes tackling and preventing battery fires and keeping us safe. Joining our firefighting heroes who keep us safe on the frontline are our waste workers: the Bin Lorry Operators, to the Waste Site workers who sort through discarded tech, educate colleagues and crucially, prevent fires from happening at all.
Each of our ten heroes know the devastating impacts of these fires. With the National Fire Chiefs Council warning that “fires involving lithium-ion batteries are a disaster waiting to happen”, first responders, particularly the fire services, can often find themselves tackling suspected battery fires for days, especially in waste centres.
London Fire Brigade Station Officer Shawn Howlett, who has attended a number of suspected lithium-ion battery fires, said, “In over thirty years at the fire service, one of the most complex suspected battery fires I attended was earlier this year when a bin lorry caught alight on John Adam Street in Central London. When we arrived, a fire was evident in the rear of the truck but the vehicle had suffered a power failure. This resulted in really restricted access to the fire itself and us having to cut through the vehicle in order to reach the waste and extinguish all of the flames. We had four engines and our fire rescue unit on scene for over four hours. Fortunately, the fire happened in the very early hours of the day so the impact wasn’t as bad as it might have been for the local community.
“Battery fires are becoming increasingly common. These are usually lithium-ion batteries, which are volatile, reignite suddenly and produce an extremely toxic smoke which should never be inhaled. In particular, waste battery fires can be completely avoidable. The public needs to understand the risks of throwing away their batteries and electrical items in their everyday rubbish. The batteries end up becoming crushed in bin lorries or at waste sites and that is what triggers these fires. For us at the fire service, these incidents, on occasion, can tie up a huge amount of resources which affects our ability to be able to respond to other emergencies.
“My Christmas wish is for people to be aware to always recycle, and to never bin their batteries.”
But it’s not just the fire services who are impacted by fires caused by waste electricals being binned. They’re a “constant worry” according to Danni Kelly, Assistant Contract Manager for a SUEZ waste site in Doncaster. One member of her team, Ricky Taylor, a Bin Lorry Loader, has experienced three battery fires this year alone. Ricky shared that the dramatic increase in waste at Christmastime means he and his team are more vigilant than ever about preventing fires at this time of year. He gave a recent experience as an example, “A fire in the back of a collection vehicle is one of the things we dread most. A battery can go from nothing to a full-blown blaze in seconds, putting not just me but the whole crew at risk. In a recent incident, we were told to eject the load onto the road to stop the fire spreading – this is the safest way to prevent the lorry and its fuel from making the fire worse. The fire brigade attended, checked everything over and advised we could reload the waste… but the fire restarted because the battery was still smouldering. We had to empty the entire load in a residential street while fire crews stayed to make sure it didn’t reignite. It’s really important people realise how common these fires are becoming. Unless we get the message out, more people are at risk of getting seriously hurt.”
But our heroes don’t just work on the front line. There’s teams of heroes across the waste sector working tirelessly to raise mass awareness of how we can all recycle and dispose of batteries safely – in homes and in businesses. Kamila Walczak, a Team Leader at recycling centre SWEEEP says, “When recycling any electrical item, if you can, make sure the battery is removed from the item so that there’s less chance of it being missed and ending up in the wrong waste stream. Most importantly, always recycle electrical waste separately from household recycling or rubbish. Companies like SWEEEP are the correct place for electricals to get recycled safely but we can only do that when they get put into the correct dedicated containers.”
Cheap, quick and easy-to-buy electricals – or FastTech – have quickly gripped the nation, rocketing in accessibility and popularity with the advent of sites such as Amazon, Temu, Shein and Wish etc. It’s no wonder then, that the FastTech trend is growing as fast as Fast Fashion.
As new research from Recycle Your Electricals shows that Christmas is the most popular season for FastTech (cheap, small electricals) with a total of 443m FastTech* items flooding the UK for the festive period alone, Christmas is fast becoming the unofficial peak of the FastTech e-waste environmental challenge. But with 168m light-up FastTech and FastTech gifts ending up in the bin, we must consider not just how this trend is contributing to the rise in battery fires, but also wasting valuable materials inside each electrical. These precious metals – lithium, copper and even gold – could instead be recycled for a second life as wind turbines, life-saving medical equipment and children’s playground equipment.
How can consumers help? As well as properly recycling batteries and electricals at designated drop-off points, there are other ways consumers can help stem the tide of FastTech – without losing the magic of Christmas. Now that a quarter of all FastTech “gifts” are bought for Secret Santa or as stocking fillers – consumer expert Professor Cathrine Jansson-Boyd says, “The key to a good Christmas present is to ensure that it is durable, so people can enjoy it for a long time. This helps to create long-lasting emotional connections with the receiver. So not only will the present warm a heart at Christmas, but continue to do so every time it is being used.”
Cathrine Jansson-Boyd has also provided the following tips on the psychology behind panic buying and the reasons we do it
UK residents can find their nearest drop off point thanks to Recycle Your Electricals Recycling Locator, which has over 30,000 recycling points.
For more information:
materialfocus@welcometoshook.com
Notes to Editors:
Wider tips from Cathrine Jansson-Boyd:
Case Studies available:
SWEEEP
GAP
London Fire Brigade
BIFFA
Consumer case study experiencing a local battery fire
Consumer case study to speak to Xmas FastTech purchasing
Content available: Images and video, battery fires in waste sites and bin lorries, fire fighter and local resident case studies, wider electricals recycling tips
Report comprises:
Christmas lights research methodology
Battery Fire research with local authorities methodology
In 2024, Material Focus sent a survey to local authorities across the UK. Material Focus asked local authorities if they had experienced any fires caused by crushed or damaged batteries in the waste stream and any further details they could give. 77 local authorities responded to the survey, stating that 242 fires had occurred. This equates to an average of 3.14 fires per local authority area. This number was then averaged across the 382 local authorities in the UK to over 1,200 fires. Out of the 53 areas who responded to the detailed survey, 50 of those surveyed said that fires are increasing, equalling 94%.
About Material Focus
Material Focus is a not-for-profit organisation whose goal is to stop the nation throwing away or hoarding all their old, small electricals. Material Focus is delivering the UK-wide Recycle Your Electricals campaign. The campaign is revealing the value hidden in electricals and is making it easier for us all to recycle and reuse the small electricals we no longer need by providing more recycling points as well as providing practical information on how households can reuse and recycle.
The campaign is funded by producers of electrical appliances which pays for a range of activities, including communications, behaviour change activities, increased recycling projects and research. Ultimately the aim is to support actions that will help the UK increase the levels of reuse and recycling of waste electricals.
| Light-up FastTech items purchased | Total |
| Christmas string / hanging Lights (e.g. outdoor traditional fairy LED lights, festoon lights, icicle style lights) | 39m |
| Light-up Christmas items (e.g. Light-up Christmas garland, wreaths, stars, snow globe etc.) | 28m |
| Light-up Christmas figures/characters (e.g. Light-up Santa, snowman, reindeer, elves etc.) | 23m |
| Light-up Christmas clothing (e.g. Christmas jumper with lights) | 18m |
| Pre-lit Christmas trees (An article tree that comes with lights attached/wires into the branches) | 16m |
| Rank | FastTech items bought for Christmas (gifts for others + self) | Total Bought |
| 1 | Non-rechargeable batteries | 17m |
| 2 | Re-chargeable batteries | 13.7m |
| 3 | LED lights e.g. night light, motion lights | 13.4m |
| 4 | Earbuds / earphones | 11m |
| 5 | Solar lights | 10.4m |
| 6 | Charging cable | 10.2m |
| 7 | Charger/power bank | 10.2m |
| 8 | Electric toothbrush | 9.8m |
| 9 | Headphones – including sleep headphones | 9.8m |
| 10 | Decorative LED lights e.g. for Christmas, neon wall lights | 9.6m |
| Rank | FastTech items bought as gifts thrown away across 12 months | TOTAL Thrown Away |
| 1 | Non-rechargeable batteries | 5.4m |
| 2 | LED lights e.g. night light, motion lights | 3.5m |
| 3 | Vapes – including rechargeable and disposable vapes | 3.4m |
| 4 | Decorative LED lights e.g. for Christmas, neon wall lights | 2.8m |
| 5 | Electric toothbrush | 2.8m |
| 6 | Fitness tech (for example, fitness watches/ trackers, or pedometers) | 2.6m |
| 7 | Earbuds / earphones | 2.4m |
| 8 | Solar lights | 2.3m |
| 9 | Headphones – including sleep headphones | 2.3m |
| 10 | LED clock | 2m |
| Rank | Regions buying light-up FastTech items | Total Bought |
| 1 | London | 38.3m |
| 2 | North West | 21.8m |
| 3 | South East | 20.9m |
| 4 | East Midlands | 16.6m |
| 5 | Scotland | 13.7m |
| 6 | Northern Ireland | 13.6m |
| 7 | West Midlands | 13.4m |
| 8 | Yorkshire and Humberside | 13.1m |
| 9 | South West | 12.1m |
| 10 | East of England | 9.2m |
| Rank | Regions binning FastTech light-up items | Total Thrown Away |
| 1 | London | 26.7m |
| 2 | North West | 14.5m |
| 3 | South East | 11m |
| 4 | East Midlands | 10.9m |
| 5 | West Midlands | 8.5m |
| 6 | Scotland | 7.4m |
| 7 | Yorkshire and Humberside | 7.3m |
| 8 | Northern Ireland | 5.7m |
| 8 | East of England | 5.6m |
| 10 | South West | 5m |
One of our friendly team will be happy to help.
