By Jeremy Rochow
Published: Thursday, November 5, 2020
Updated: December 9, 2020 at 12:44 pm
About 1.4 million child seats, capsules and booster seats are sold in Australia every year. Over the same period 200,000 child restraints will end up in landfill.
With most kids having to use child or booster seats until they’re about 10-12 years old, most parents go through multiple restraints.
Unfortunately, it’s difficult to recycle child restraints as they’re made up of many different materials – rigid plastic, metal and fabric – all working together to provide a comfortable and safe restraint.
But at RAA, you can recycle your old child restraint by taking it to the Child Safety Centre at Mile End.
RAA Child Safety Expert Belinda Maloney said child restraints don’t last forever due to degradation of the plastic over time and general wear and tear.
“Restraints can only be used for 10 years and we want to keep them out of landfill, so we’ve started offering this recycling service,” Ms Maloney said.
“If you have an old or damaged restraint, you can bring it to the Child Safety Centre at Mile End.”
It costs $5 to recycle your seat and, if you’re a RAA member, you’ll receive a $5 gift voucher to use on your next child restraint purchase.
The materials recovered from the dismantled seats will be ground up and used as low-emission fuels.