Today’s good news story comes from the blog #PassItOn. 

It was sent to me by Monika, the head rancher at Tales Around the Ranch blog

Teen Helps Keep 655,000 Batteries Out of Landfills.

May 13, 2025 by By Cathy Stack

EDISON, New Jersey—A 10-year-old started a nationwide movement with a campaign to keep discarded batteries out of landfills.

After watching the news with his family and seeing a waste disposal plant fire that had been caused by a lithium-ion battery, Sri Nihal Tammana decided to do some research. He learned that people discard 15 billion batteries each year, and most end up in landfills. These batteries can create toxic chemical pollution and dangerous fires.

Motivated to tackle the environmental hazard, Sri Nihal began collecting batteries in his neighborhood. After recruiting volunteers to help, the effort soon laid the groundwork for developing a full-scale non-profit program.

When Sri Nihal began his environmental movement, he collected the batteries and then took them to a retail store that offered a recycling program. To his disappointment, the store notified him that he would have to discontinue his effort due to the bin’s limited capacity.

Determined to continue the program, Sri Nihal contacted Call2Recycle to form a partnership. Call2Recycle agreed to provide free, fire-proof recycling bins for school libraries and various business offices. Encouraged, Sri Nihal then contacted his school district’s superintendent for permission to place the bins in the school district’s 19 schools, which he received. Then he recruited students to volunteer their time to distribute the bins.

The program has now evolved into a non-profit organization, Recycle My Battery, which installs the battery recycling bins in strategic public places. To date, nearly 655,000 batteries have been deposited in these bins and kept out of landfills. The organization also educates millions about the importance of preventing environmental harm by recycling batteries.

“If I can make Earth a better place to live, you can!” encourages Sri Nihal. “If you can make Earth a better place to live, we all can!”

Battery recycling provides several environmental benefits. Keeping batteries out of landfills prevents harmful elements and chemicals, such as mercury and lead, from seeping into groundwater. Recycling these materials also conserves natural resources, which helps prevent further pollution from extraction processes. It also aids in the prevention of dangerous fires.

Recycle My Battery has grown to a team of 900 passionate student volunteers. There are 1,000 bins in schools, libraries, and businesses nationwide.

Students can start a school-based battery recycling challenge by signing up on the Recycle My Battery website. Individuals can also visit the website to request a battery recycling bin or to start a chapter in their own community.

“Earth gives us so much – oxygen, food, water – everything!”– so it’s important that we give something back when we can,” Sri Nihal said.

In 2022, Sri Nihal received the CNN Heroes Young Wonder Award for his work creating Recycle My Battery.

Now 16, he continues to spread the movement. Through media news outlets, school programs and corporate workshops, he increases public awareness about the program and its impact on the environment. He has delivered two TED talks in which he discusses the hazards of battery waste and solutions to address the problem. He and his team also set a Guinness World Record for laying out the longest line of batteries.

“Through education, innovation, and advocacy, I aim to mobilize millions more changemakers and ensure a cleaner, safer planet for future generations—one battery at a time,” said Sri Nihal.

The Foundation and PassItOn believe that Sri Nihal is a hero. His inspiring action is a great example of making a difference. His work provides a powerful reminder that through passion, dedication, and action, we can all make a positive change in the world.

Here is a link to learn more about this effort.

The good news is that a youngster started a movement to help reduce waste. The reason this is good news is recycled batteries are processed to recover valuable materials, including metals and plastics, which are then reused in new products, including new batteries. The process typically involves shredding, sorting, and then either melting or dissolving the components for materials recovery.  Today’s JohnKu talks about involvement. I hope you have a great weekend. Thanks again for this inspiring story, Monika.

Action by John W. Howell © 2025

Some curse the darkness,

Others take action for light . . .

Which side are we on?

Today’s story comes from the Good News Network.

If the man on the street had to guess the best metric for healthy aging, they might say blood pressure, cholesterol levels, lean muscle mass, blood triglycerides, or even telomere length if they follow aging science closely.

But it turns out that one of the best is grip strength. According to Joshua Davis at the University of Derby, UK, this relatively underdeveloped conditioning area is increasingly recognized as one of the most reliable markers of human health.

Grip strength is associated with positive health outcomes, whether measuring for diabetes risk or depression, and you don’t need any expensive equipment to measure it. Davis recommends you simply pop the top off a can of tennis balls.

“Being able to maintain a maximal squeeze on something like a tennis ball for 15-30 seconds would be a good standard to strive for,” Davis told the BBC.

It’s not necessarily the case that being the one in the house whose hands are the most capable of opening a stubborn pickle jar means you’ll live the longest. Instead, it’s the case that grip strength is an efficient proxy for total muscle conditioning, which is itself an excellent proxy for overall nutrition, physical activity, and disease profiles. In other words, it’s a proxy for a proxy.

For example, the BBC report cites one study that found grip strength to be an effective predictor of sarcopenia, the decline in muscle conditioning associated with aging, strongly correlated with mortality. Another study found that of those in middle age who had their grip strength measured in 1965, the ones who lived to be 100 were 2.5 times more likely to have had grip strength results in the highest third.

Yet another paper found that grip strength has a prognostic value for human longevity that exceeds blood pressure, one of the vital signs controlled for in every hospital patient.

It’s almost certainly not the case that developing grip strength alone will protect against disease and early mortality; as mentioned above, it’s a proxy for overall muscle conditioning.

There’s an old saying in medicine: “Break your hip, die of pneumonia.”

Muscle mass is one of the best defenses against the ravages of age. It cushions the joints and bones and provides protection from falls and the subsequent fractures that gave rise to this ghastly adage. It also soaks up excess glucose in the blood to reduce the risk of developing type 2 diabetes or insulin resistance.

The BBC also spoke with Mark Peterson, a physical medicine and rehabilitation professor at the University of Michigan. Peterson conducted a 2022 study that found that deep down in our DNA, patterns of methylated molecules in those with weak grip strength indicated they were aging at an accelerated rate.

If you don’t have a grip dynamometer to measure precisely how much force your handshake can exert, you can always perform the tennis ball test.

The good news in this article is not the grip as an indicator of overall health, but the idea of the benefits of continuing exercises to maintain muscle mass. Is it worth it? Yes. Today’s JohnKu talks about health. I hope you have a wonderful weekend.

Our Future by John W. Howell © 2025

When it comes to health,

We are in charge of our own. . .

Don’t stop exercise.