It’s not a project for most people, but watching someone ride up to 20 miles, and up to 30 mph, on tossed-out vape batteries is transfixing.

Disposable vapes are indefensible. Many, or maybe most, of them contain rechargeable lithium-ion batteries, but manufacturers prefer to sell new ones.

To make a point about how wasteful this practice is—and to also make a pretty rad project and video—Chris Doel took 130 disposable vape batteries (the bigger “3,500 puff” types with model 20400 cells) found littered at a music festival and converted them into a 48-volt, 1,500-watt e-bike battery, one that powered an e-bike with almost no pedaling more than 20 miles. You can see the whole build and watch Doel zoom along trails on his YouTube video.

  • normalexit@lemmy.worldEnglish
    161·
    16 days ago

    They are super common where weed is legal. People fly into somewhere like Denver for the weekend to catch a show. Rather than buying a reusable battery, they will get a disposable vape (and probably some gummies).

    Then it ends up in the landfill or as litter. I am in favor of making these one time use electronics illegal (along with single use plastics like balloons, plastic silverware, etc… but that is another thread)

    • bluewing@lemm.eeEnglish
      31·
      16 days ago

      Yeah, I live in legal weed state. The nearest dispensary is a mere 20 miles away. I’m not even sure they sell vapes. Flower and edibles for sure, but I have no idea if they sell vapes. (I’ve never been there-- weed just ain’t my thing). But I still don’t see any used ones tossed out. Maybe we are just neater people here and don’t litter.