Circular Economy Infrastructure Fund: Hazardous Waste – Funded projects

Round 4 of the Circular Economy Infrastructure Fund (CEIF) – Hazardous Waste supports local councils and registered charities to install new, or upgrade existing, battery drop off points and to promote those locations.

This fund aims to give Victorians greater access to battery drop off locations. Funded activities focus on infrastructure purchase and installation at convenient locations and advertising costs.

Fund recipients

Announcement date: 2 March 2026

Glein Eira City Council

Project: Following a successful vape and e-cigarettes collection and recycling service trial (pilot project), Glen Eira Council will:

• upgrade an existing vape collection point to a larger receptacle that can accommodate larger volumes
• install additional 5 collection points throughout the municipality. Each drop off point will include a secured bin, spare bin for safe collection/swap over and a fire extinguisher. 

Portable fireproof Li-ion battery protection bags will also be purchased and used by the council officers in charge of parks, gardens, public places and waterways to collect littered vapes.

Funding: $12,095

Macedon Ranges Shire Council

Project: Macedon Ranges Shire Council will expand and upgrade community recycling infrastructure to collect battery and vapes across the Macedon Ranges. To maximise their impact, the hubs will be supported by a shire-wide advertising and information campaign. This campaign will promote the new drop-off points, increase community awareness of safe disposal options, and encourage positive recycling behaviours. 

Funding: $15,712

Pyrenees Shire

Project: Pyrenees Shire Council will set up three new battery drop off points at Beaufort and Avoca Transfer Stations, and the Shire’s Municipal Offices, libraries and community rooms. Pyrenees Shire Council will also upgrade its two existing drop off points at Beaufort and Avoca Community Resource Centres.

Funding: $19,603

Brimbank City Council

Project: Brimbank City Council requested infrastructure funding to install 4 new e-waste hubs at community buildings. The new fireproof hubs will accept batteries, mobiles, vapes and small electrical items. Existing e-waste hubs will be upgraded.

Funding: $17,560

Surf Coast Council

Project: Surf Coast Shire will establish 13 new collection points for small e-waste and batteries across its shire. The project will increase the shire existing collection points from 5 to a total of 18. Surf Coast Shire will also promote the new drop off points using the advertising funding. 

The new collection points and its promotion will enable greater diversion of e-waste and batteries from landfill and reduce fire risks.

Funding: $19,872

Strathbogie Shire Council

Project: Strathbogie Shire Council will install 3 new Bulk E-Waste Stations at their busiest transfer stations (Euroa, Nagambie and Violet Town). These stations will make it easy for residents to safely drop off batteries, vapes and small e-waste items. Strathbogie Shire will also run a simple promotional campaign using SV assets to spread the word through local papers, social media and on-site signage. The project will give their community safer, more convenient options for recycling tricky items and help keep hazardous waste out of landfill.

Funding: $20,660

City of Ballarat

Project: City of Ballarat will expand its battery hub to 4 new locations, providing an easy and accessible recycling service for the community to safely dispose of hazardous e-waste items such as batteries and vapes. The hubs will be installed in high-traffic public buildings—the City of Ballarat’s main customer service centre and public libraries—areas that experience high foot traffic and visibility. The new hubs will also be promoted through a campaign using social media advertising.

Funding: $18,146

Campaspe Shire Council

Project: Campaspe Shire Council will implement and promote in-town battery and mobile phone drop-off at Council’s five customer service centres as well as enable e-waste collection walls to be installed at Echuca and Rochester libraries, helping educate and promote safe e-waste recycling. Additionally, it will also refresh its drop off signage and streams at their resource recovery centres.

Funding: $21,050

City of Greater Bendigo

Project: City of Greater Bendigo will improve infrastructure for safe storage of batteries of various chemistries at drop off points in City of Greater Bendigo recycling centres

Funding: $6,000

Baw Baw Shire Council

Project: Baw Baw Shire council will install 4-bank e-waste battery collection units at each of its customer service centres in Drouin and Warragul for the safe and secure collection of household batteries and embedded batteries including small e-waste less than 5 kgs. Funding will also be used to promote the new drop off locations.

Funding: $15,686

East Gippsland Shire Council

Project: East Gippsland Shire Council will install loose battery and embedded battery collection cabinets at 6 of their high-traffic community facilities including libraries and recreation centres.

Funding: $20,000

Golden Plains Shire Council

Project: Golden Plain Shire Council will implement fireproof, UN-compliant containment solutions specifically designed for the safe isolation and storage of damaged batteries. By adopting these measures, Council will mitigate fire risk, prevent chemical leaks, and ensure compliance with best practice safety and regulatory standards – ultimately enhancing community safety and strengthening operational resilience.

Funding: $1,945

Yarra Ranges Shire Council

Project: Yarra Ranges Shire Council will install recycling hubs in four locations across Yarra Ranges Shire Council. The hub will be accessible to the community to dispose batteries, vapes, embedded battery small e-waste and other difficult to recycle items.

Funding: $9,106

Brainwave Australia

Project: Brainwave Bikes will establish a new, high-capacity Safe Battery and E-Waste Collection Hub at Brainwave Bikes, Australia's largest e-bike recycler. Brainwave Bikes will purchase and install three specialised battery storage bins, designed for the safe collection and temporary storage of hazardous waste, specifically high-risk e-bike batteries. Brainwave Bikes is a key B-cycle partner, the purchase of these bins will allow them to safely accept e-bikes for donation and ensure the compliant recycling of their associated lithium-ion batteries.

Funding: $11,679

Fund recipients

Announcement date: 26 April 2024

Ecocycle

Ecocycle will establish a lithium battery and embedded battery processing and recycling plant at their existing site in Campbellfield. The plant will have a processing capacity of 1 tonne per hour to safely process loose batteries as well as batteries embedded within devices with lithium-ion and all other battery chemistries and recover metals, plastics, and valuable critical metals and minerals from each battery cell and embedded battery device. The Project is a solution for Victoria’s hazardous battery and embedded battery waste.

Funding: $2,000,000

Repurpose It

Repurpose It will invest in equipment to optimise and upgrade their 2 soil washing plants located at the Epping site with the aim to diversify their hazardous waste recovery capabilities and improve quality of recoverable material for reintegration into commercial and industrial construction projects.

The project will treat Category B, C and D contaminated soils, oily waste waters, sludges and slurries and also increase capabilities to treat low level PFAS in soils, making it commercially viable to treat and divert this waste from landfill.

Funding: $1,450,000

Fund recipients

Announcement date: 20 October 2022

EarthSure

EarthSure (a joint venture between Ventia and Veolia) will relocate a soil washing plant as a supplementary treatment option on their existing waste management site in Dandenong South. The soil washing plant will transform contaminated soils into beneficial reuse products.

The existing EarthSure facility onsite remediates Category A (most hazardous type of waste) and B contaminated soils using state-of-the-art thermal desorption technology. The addition of the soil washing facility provides another cost effective and sustainable reuse options, particularly for Category C soils, diverting these from landfill.

The output of the soil washing plant is a range of sands and aggregates that can be returned to the site of origin or reused for civil and construction projects. The small amount of waste concentrate from soil washing is treated onsite by thermal desorption, meaning no transport of residues is required.

Objectives

• Increase the recovery and local reprocessing of hazardous waste
• Relocate up to 30 tonne per hour soil washing plant
• Divert more than 160,000 tonnes of Category C soils from landfill per annum
• Provide 98% of washed soils for beneficially reused as construction materials
• Generate a new circular economy business model and jobs in Victoria.

Funding: $1,155,846

Cleanaway 

Cleanaway will build a new ozofractionation plant at their Campbellfield site to treat PFAS contaminated water. PFAS are a group of chemicals that do not easily break down in the environment and can be harmful to human and animal life.

This will be the first commercial-scale plant built in Australia utilising ozofractionation technology. Volume of waste disposed to landfill generated through traditional GAC/resin technologies will considerably reduce by using the new technology.

Objectives

• Increase the recovery and local reprocessing of hazardous waste, and manage this material in line with the waste hierarchy.
• Increase economic development opportunities such as jobs, economic performance and growth of hubs.

Funding: $826,867