ReCellular, Dexter, Mich., a leading electronics sustainability firm, has announced a new strategic partnership with TerraCycle.

The partnership provides a convenient solution for TerraCycle to expand their upcycling efforts to include consumer electronics, the company says. TerraCycle first launched the Brigade concept in 2006, paying schools and non-profits to collect 20-ounce soda bottles. In just two years, the programs raised more than $100,000, primarily donated to public-school organizations, and rescued and reused tens of millions of soda bottles, yogurt cups, and snack wrappers.

Based on the success of their bottle and wrapper brigades, TerraCycle decided to expand their upcycling collections to help address the estimated 65,000 tons of cell phones that are discarded every year.

Anyone can sign up to participate in the TerraCycle Phone Brigade. For program details and to donate cell phones, visit http://www.terracycle.net/cellphone/cellphone.htm.

After volunteers donate cell phones through the Brigade, the phones will be delivered to the ReCellular phone processing facility. There, phones are either refurbished and reprogrammed for reuse, or are recycled to reclaim materials needed to make new electronics equipment, such as precious metals from circuit boards, heavy metals from batteries.

“Economic, social and environmental sustainability have been at the core of our business long before the term ‘triple-bottom line’ was coined,” says Chuck Newman, CEO and founder of ReCellular. “Today, we are proud to be a part of the emerging green economy, and to partner with an innovative company such as TerraCycle. We look forward to expanding this relationship over the coming months.”

By the end of the year, the partnership hopes to have more than a thousand brigades that collect and donate cell phones, raise funds for local causes and keep e-scrap out of landfills.