We all love our gadgets, right? Well, those gadgets lead to a lot of thrown out batteries – 3 billion annually to be exact. In each of these batteries is a chemical soup of lead, nickel, cobalt, zinc, manganese dioxide and more that if put in a landfill will leach into our water, air and soil.

The easiest way to prevent this is to recycle. You can find a spot close to you here or look for recycling stations at Batteries Plus, Home Depot, Staples, and Best Buy, among others.

Better yet we can switch to rechargeable batteries. When used properly, rechargeable batteries can be used thousands of times and will save money in the long run.

And then of course, we could also cut down on our gizmo use and get outside!