Vape Waste: Extreme Lead, Copper and Zinc Levels Found in Discarded Disposable E-Cigarettes

Vape waste has so far entered the waste-management agenda mainly as a fire-prone electronic waste stream. A study published in March 2026, which reached a wider audience in September, now casts the problem in a second light: the residual e-liquid left inside fourth-generation disposable pod devices carries heavy-metal concentrations high enough to raise public-health, environmental and occupational-safety questions at the same time. What sets the work apart is that it did not analyse products taken off retail shelves — it analysed what actually reaches the waste stream.

The study was led by Andrew Turner of the University of Plymouth, with co-authors John W. Scott and Maya C. Dabrowski, both researchers at the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center. The findings appeared in the journal Environmental Monitoring and Assessment.

Why samples were taken from the bin

Earlier elemental analyses of e-cigarettes have typically examined unopened, commercially purchased products. This team instead worked from used disposable nicotine devices collected from the waste stream of a Chicago-area vape shop: e-liquids from 44 used and three new devices, spanning different manufacturers and flavours.

The samples were extracted in dilute nitric acid and analysed by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES). The methodological choice matters, because it measures what genuinely remains inside a discarded device — and what can therefore escape into the environment on improper disposal. In the UK, initial screening was done with a portable X-ray fluorescence instrument; the first readings showed lead levels so high that the US team initially suspected a measurement error.

What the measurements showed

Several metals and metalloids were effectively absent. Arsenic, barium, cadmium, cobalt, chromium, manganese and vanadium were rarely detected, and their concentrations never exceeded 10 mg per kilogram of e-liquid.

Five elements behaved very differently. Aluminium, copper, nickel, lead and zinc showed sample-to-sample variation spanning several orders of magnitude. The most concerning finding: nickel and lead regularly exceeded 100 mg/kg, while copper and zinc regularly exceeded 1,000 mg/kg.

These are not trace amounts. For lead, the authors place the values among the highest ever reported in an e-cigarette product.

Is the device or the liquid the source?

The obvious explanation would be leaching from internal components — the heating coil, solder joints, contacts — into the liquid. The data support that only partially.

Nickel can indeed be accounted for by leaching from metallic parts in contact with the e-liquid. Copper, lead and zinc cannot. These three elements correlated strongly with one another, and their concentrations rose as the remaining liquid mass fell. That pattern indicates the e-liquid is contaminated with these metals from the outset, and that they progressively concentrate in the residual liquid as the device is used.

The conclusion is reinforced by the small number of unused devices tested: their results matched those from used units, meaning the contamination is not generated through vaping. The team also examined the pH of the liquids, in part to rule out acid-driven leaching from other components.

The dual burden on waste management: leachate and fire

The waste-management consequence arrives from two directions.

The first is contaminant load. When devices go to landfill with mixed municipal waste, the metal-enriched residual liquid can mobilise lead, copper, zinc and nickel into landfill leachate. Where leachate is not properly collected and treated, that becomes a groundwater contamination risk. The effect is localised, but device counts make it cumulative: the team estimates that hundreds of thousands of disposable vapes are thrown away every day in the United States, and possibly millions per week in the United Kingdom.

The second is fire risk, which the waste industry has been flagging for years. According to the study, roughly one waste-system fire per day in the UK is linked to vape batteries crushed or damaged during collection or sorting. This is not a defect specific to one product; it reflects the rising share of lithium-ion cells in residual waste generally, with vapes as the most visible and fastest-growing segment. Short-term mitigation is largely technological — AI-driven battery detection in sorting plants is currently one of the few interventions that demonstrably reduces fire incidence.

Scott frames vaping as a twofold problem: a major solid-waste problem and a health problem at once. On the common argument that vaping is the safer alternative to smoking, his assessment is that it is at least as bad, if not worse.

The occupational angle that rarely gets discussed

The paper singles out a point with direct operational relevance: metal-enriched residual e-liquid poses an occupational risk during storage, handling and, above all, component dismantling.

This is not hypothetical. The researchers found battery removal extremely difficult in practice — housings are glued, pressed, and in many cases can only be opened destructively. Anyone dismantling these devices by hand faces mechanical and chemical exposure simultaneously. And because standardised collection and disposal routes are largely absent, manual teardown is often the only available path.

The cheapest product was the most contaminated

One of the study’s most uncomfortable findings is social rather than analytical. According to Scott, one brand stood out across nearly every sample — not only for lead, but for extremely high copper and zinc levels as well. That brand was also the cheapest of those tested.

The environmental-justice implication follows directly: people who buy the least expensive devices for financial reasons face a higher likelihood of heavy-metal exposure. The regulatory picture offers little help. Testing for solvents and certain contaminants is mandated in various jurisdictions, but heavy-metal screening is generally neither visible nor clearly communicated to consumers — and label formats and font sizes often make safety information unreadable even where it is present.

What the study does not claim

An honest reading requires one important limitation. The work did not measure what proportion of these metals transfers into inhaled aerosol, or how much actually reaches the lungs during normal use.

The authors did estimate an upper bound through mass-balance calculations, comparing new and used products of the same brand and flavour: per device, up to roughly 8,000 µg of copper, 500 µg of lead and 6,000 µg of zinc could potentially be inhaled. That is a theoretical ceiling, not a measured exposure. Even so, the authors argue that the liquid-phase concentrations alone justify stronger monitoring and regulation of harmful metals in e-liquids.

Where the solutions point

The team calls first for design intervention: housings that allow easy battery removal, recyclable plastics, and refillable systems in place of single-use devices. Scott’s caveat is soberly commercial, however — manufacturers have little incentive to build longer-lasting, easier-to-dismantle products, because disposability is precisely what drives repeat sales.

That pushes the weight onto regulation and collection. On the collection side, retail take-back is the most promising near-term lever, and dedicated pilots are already testing how it works in practice — the Munich LiLA II project is trialling exactly this model for e-cigarettes and heated tobacco devices at the point of sale.

The behavioural gap

In legal terms, a disposable vape is neither plastic packaging waste nor tobacco residue: it is waste electrical and electronic equipment with an embedded lithium-ion battery. The correct route is therefore the e-waste channel — civic amenity sites, designated collection points, or retail take-back — not the residual bin.

Practice falls far short of that. International surveys consistently show that most users discard devices with municipal waste, and the driver is rarely ignorance of the rules; it is the absence of a convenient route. The pattern mirrors what is already documented for consumer electronics more broadly, where a large share of old devices is either binned or hoarded at home rather than returned for recovery.

There is also a less obvious failure mode, visible in countries that have already banned the product. In Hungary, flavoured e-cigarettes and refill liquids cannot lawfully be sold at all; retail is restricted to National Tobacco Shops and distance selling into the country is prohibited, which in practice leaves only refillable, unflavoured devices on the legal market. Disposable devices nevertheless arrive through grey channels — unlicensed webshops, social-media advertising, cross-border purchase — and become waste on the same timescale as anywhere else.

Because no producer registers them, reports volumes or pays extended producer responsibility fees, the resulting waste stream is orphaned: the cost of collection and the fire risk fall on the municipal system, while the entity that placed the product on the market sits outside the scheme by definition. A prohibition, on its own, does not eliminate the waste problem — it can simply make it invisible to the financing mechanism designed to handle it.

The newly published measurements add a fresh argument to this debate. Until now, vapes have featured on the waste agenda mainly as a fire hazard and as lost raw material. In light of the heavy-metal content, the question shifts toward hazardous waste — with the distinction that this particular hazardous waste enters the system billions of units at a time, one pocket at a time.

---

Frequently asked questions about vape waste

Why is vape waste a risk in landfill?

The e-liquid left inside discarded devices is enriched in lead, copper, zinc and nickel. If the device goes to landfill with mixed municipal waste, these metals can mobilise into leachate and, where leachate is not properly collected and treated, threaten groundwater. The embedded lithium-ion cell also causes fires when crushed during collection or sorting.

Which metals were found in disposable vape liquids?

The study highlighted five elements: aluminium, copper, nickel, lead and zinc. Nickel and lead regularly exceeded 100 mg per kilogram of e-liquid, while copper and zinc regularly exceeded 1,000 mg per kilogram. Arsenic, cadmium, chromium and several other metals appeared only rarely, and never above 10 mg per kilogram.

Do the metals leach out of the device components?

Only partly. Nickel can be explained by leaching from metallic parts in contact with the liquid, but copper, lead and zinc cannot. These elements were present in unused devices too, and they concentrated progressively in the residual liquid as it was consumed. The e-liquid is therefore contaminated from the outset, not by vaping.

Where should a used disposable vape be taken?

A disposable vape is electrical and electronic equipment with an embedded battery, so it belongs in the e-waste stream. The correct routes are civic amenity sites, designated collection points, or retail take-back schemes — never the residual waste bin. Devices binned with household waste create fire risk in collection vehicles and sorting plants.

Did the study prove the metals reach users’ lungs?

No. The research measured the liquid phase and explicitly did not test transfer into inhaled aerosol. Using mass balance, the authors estimated only a theoretical upper bound: per device, up to roughly 8,000 micrograms of copper, 6,000 of zinc and 500 of lead. That is an estimated ceiling, not a measured exposure.

---

Sources:

• Turner, A., Scott, J. W., & Dabrowski, M. C. (2026). Aluminium, copper, nickel, lead and zinc in e-liquids from contemporary disposable vapes. Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, 198, 344. DOI: 10.1007/s10661-026-15145-z
• University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign News Bureau (8 September 2026): Vape waste poses risks to health and environment, analysis finds