For years, the debate surrounding vaping largely centered on its risks for high school and middle school students enticed by flavors like gummy bear, lemonade and watermelon.
But the recent shift toward e-cigarettes that can’t be refilled has created a new environmental dilemma. The devices, which contain nicotine, lithium and other metals, cannot be reused or recycled. Under federal environmental law, they also aren’t supposed to go in the trash.
U.S. teens and adults are buying roughly 12 million disposable vapes per month. With little federal guidance, local officials are finding their own ways to dispose of e-cigarettes collected from schools, colleges, vape shops and other sites.
That’d be great except the FDA decimated the market outside of disposables. I now only have 1-2 shops in my (250k pop.) city selling juice, coils, mods, and batteries all with pretty limited selection and wildly high prices, where previously I could order from one of hundreds of companies online at dirt cheap prices. Most corner stores still have a full selection of cigarettes and disposables though.