On Saturday October 6 2007, the Victorian community was invited to participate in the annual RACV Great Battery Round Up.
This was a positive community initiative facilitated by the Royal Automobile Club of Victoria (RACV) and proudly sponsored by Australian Refined Alloys (ARA).
The round up aims to collect used automotive batteries and recycle them in a safe, environmentally-friendly manner. ARA provided financial support for the advertising promotion and we guaranteed to support the round up with a $5 donation for every battery collected across the state, which would be forwarded to the Royal Children’s Hospital.
The environmental and community spirit was alive and well across Victoria with people collecting up unwanted batteries at home, their workplaces and on the farm. More than 5,000 batteries were surrendered on the day, with 3,000 of the total haul netted in regional areas, with the biggest numbers derived in Echuca and Bendigo.
“The programme is all for a good cause and the outcome was a win-win,” said ARA general manager Todd Vains. “As well as helping to clean up the environment and promote the recycling of batteries, we also helped sick children at the Royal Children’s Hospital,” he added.
Representatives from the RACV and the ARA presented the Royal Children's Hospital with a cheque for $25,000 in December 2007.
The hospital has used the money to purchase two additional patient monitors. The monitors are portable and enable medical staff to monitor the patient’s heart rate, respiratory rate, blood pressure and oxygen levels and allows staff to set minimum and maximum values for each of these vital signs and trigger an alarm if these limits are reached. The staff said that these monitors will help improve patient care and for that they are very thankful.
The 2007 Great Battery Round Up was a big success. More than 20,000 batteries have been collected during the four annual round ups. We look forward to building on this success in 2008.
