Bjerregaard’s car recycling measures run into barriers

Date: 27/03/1997

HEAVY lobbying by the European car industry is frustrating attempts by Environment Commissioner Ritt Bjerregaard to introduce more stringent recycling requirements for old cars.

Work on a proposed EU directive on 'end-of-life' vehicles was completed last year, but Bjerregaard's efforts to put it before the full Commission are being blocked by her industry counterpart Martin Bangemann.

The dispute highlights a broader debate between those in favour of further environmental legislation and industry's desire to be allowed to 'regulate' itself on a voluntary basis.

End-of-life vehicles are also something of a test case for Bjerregaard's bid to introduce into the EU law the notion of 'producer responsibility', obliging manufacturers to ensure the environmental credentials of products right up to their disposal.

Bjerregaard's overall target is to increase the proportion of each car recycled from the current average of about 75&percent; to 95&percent; by 2015.

The ramifications of the plan are enormous. Every year, between 8 and 9 million vehicles are scrapped in the EU, accounting for up to 10&percent; of the total hazardous waste generated in the Union.

But the car industry lobby ACEA believes the plan drawn up by the Directorate-General for the environment (DGXI) is badly thought out.

“DGXI wants arbitrary recycling targets for which there is no scientific justification,” said ACEA's John Hollis, who claims that industry does not need legislation imposed from above to make environmental advances.

“We already have 20 different industries desperate to clean themselves up, and industry and governments in the member states have begun installing voluntary systems on a national level,” he said.

Axel Singhofen, of the environmental group Greenpeace, claims the voluntary approach has failed dismally to ensure sufficient environmental protection. “There must be a flow-back of car parts which can be reused. It is also vital to phase out the use of hazardous substances such as lead and mercury in new cars,” he said.

But ACEA claims it is a mistake to design cars purely around recycling targets for components which only make up a small proportion of the finished product. It argues much greater environmental benefits can be gained by, for example, developing lightweight cars made of light steel covered in plastic. These would create much greater energy savings during the whole lifetime of a car than the small gains to be made from recycling non-metal car parts.

One possible lifeline for Bjerregaard's plan would be to narrow the scope of the draft directive. Currently it lays down a wide range of requirements. It would phase out the use of a number of products such as lead, mercury and PVC by 2002, and require producers to set up systems for the collection and transferral of all end-of-life vehicles to authorised treatment facilities.

No vehicle could be deregistered unless a 'certificate of destruction' had been issued, and steps would have to be taken to ensure consumers were not charged for discarding their old cars. Cars at the end of their lives would have to be stripped of all hazardous materials before being processed in scrap yards.