As teens return to class, so do their vapes — many of which will end up in the landfills by October, where they can leach toxic materials.
UBC IRES alumna Emily Shilton (she/her) is shedding light on this surprising contributor to Canada’s e-waste crisis. Her research explores how nicotine vaping devices—small, battery-powered electronics—are slipping through regulatory cracks, causing serious environmental concerns.
We already know that vaping products are a problem. “But Canadian policy makers are so busy trying to figure out whether to promote these devices as a smoking cessation tool or to limit them to protect youth health, that there just hasn’t been room in the conversation to understand the e-waste waste impacts of vaping products,” said Shilton.
Her research makes it clear: the environmental costs of vaping deserve urgent attention. She found that over 2 million kilograms of lithium batteries end up in Canadian landfills from vape devices annually.
Most people aren’t recycling their vapes. Why?
Like all e-waste, vaping devices should be taken to the appropriate facilities, not put in garbage bins. Getting people to actually recycle their electronics is already a challenge. “Even those birthday cards that sing have batteries,” Shilton said, “but no one thinks to recycle them.”
Vaping products are trickier. They fall in a recycling gray zone because many e-waste recycling facilities don’t accept them: these products are considered hazardous waste due to their nicotine solution and the fact that people use them with their mouths.
As well, vaping products are held together with glues rather than screws, so it is quite difficult to get batteries out of them. “Finally, there is the problem of scale. These products came onto the market and were adopted at an explosive rate, and our recycling systems haven’t had time to keep up,” said Shilton.
Shilton’s research uncovers the bigger picture
Shilton, then a Master’s student at IRES, work closely with Dr. Milind Kandlikar, IRES & SPPGA Professor, Dr. Alex Tavasoli (Applied Sciences; Mechanical Engineering) and Dr. Qingshi Tu (Forestry), to understand and measure the environmental impact that vape products pose.
For lab work, Shilton utilized the resources from Tu and Tavasoli’s labs as well as the UBC labs managed by Matty Jeronimo (School of Population and Public Health) and Benjamin Herring (Department of Chemistry). She also designed a survey of the Canadian and U.S. public with guidance and feedback from Kandlikar, Dr. Terre Satterfield (IRES), Dr. Jiaying Zhao (IRES/Psychology), and Neha Sharma (IRES PhD student).
Every member of this team was essential. Shilton brought together Kandlikar’s background in climate change, emerging technologies and the social response these might engender with Tavasoli and Tu’s scientific knowledge in materials manufacturing and industrial ecology.
What needs to change— now
Ultimately, the team found that vaping devices pose unique regulatory challenges and proposed bold action: an outright ban to protect both people and the planet. In a Canada where vapes were banned, greenhouse gas emissions would be reduced by approximately 89.7 million kilograms.
Survey results from 500 adult vape users in the U.S. and Canada indicate that there is no strong opposition to a disposable vape ban among current users, which may help ease concerns about public resistance to such a policy.
The success of a ban may depend on supporting infrastructure, such as ease of access to stores or even universal pod standards, to minimize disruption and support behavioural transition toward lower-impact alternatives. From a policy perspective, this work provides sufficient evidence to be used to lobby for government support for a ban on disposable vapes.