PURPOSE : the Directive aims at the prevention of waste from vehicles and, in addition, the reuse, recycling and other forms of recovery of end-of-life vehicles and their components so as to reduce the disposal of waste, as well as the improvement in the environmental performance of all of the economic operators involved in the life cycle of vehicles.
COMMUNITY MEASURE : Directive 2000/53/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on end-of-life vehicles.
CONTENT : the Directive provides that the Member States should introduce a certificate of destruction for end-of-life vehicles which could be issued to the holder and/or owner when the end-of-life vehicle is transferred to a treatment facility. Treatment facilities shall be permitted to issue a certificate of destruction. Member States may permit producers, dealers and collectors on behalf of an authorised treatment facilty to issue certificates of destruction provided they guarantee that the end-of-life vehicle is transfered to an authorised treatment facility and provided they are registereed with the public autorities.
With regard to reuse and recovery, the Member States shall take the necessary measures to encourage the reuse of components which are suitable for reuse, the recovery of components which cannot be reused and the giving of preference to recycling when environmentally viable. Member States shall take the necessary measures to ensure that the following targets are attained by economic operators. In particular, the rate of reuse and recycling of end-of-life vehicles shall be increased to a minimum of 80% by an average weight per vehicle and per year no later than 1 January 2006. For vehicles produced before 1 January 1980, Member States may lay down lower targets, but not lower than 70% for reuse and recycling. No later than 1 January 2015, for all end-of-life vehicles , the reuse and recycling shall be increased to a minimum of 85% by an average weight per vehicle and year. The Council shall examine these targets by the 31 December 2005 at the latest.
It should be noted that only one solution could be found within the Conciliation Committee, in order to overcome the two obstacles, that is the date to take effect of the provision relating to the responsibility of the producer for costs related to the free of charge delivery of used vehicles and the question of heavy metals.
In relation to the first question, that is the date from which the delivery of the end-of-life vehicle to the treatment facility will be without charges to the holder, the car manufacturer will bear all the costs linked to the delivery.
The Directive provides the following dates:
- as from 1 July 2002 for vehicles put on the market as from this date;
- from 1 January 2007 for vehicles put on the market before 1 July 2002.
In addition, it is clearly stated that there is the possibility that Member States can apply these measures before the deadline, as is provided in the EC Treaty.
As for the second question, about heavy metals, the date of 1 January 2003 has been set for vehicles to no longer contain heavy metals such as lead, mercury and cadmium or hexavalent chromium. Certain necessary technical elements concerning thisban has been included in the list of exemptions. Moreover, the technical committee in charge of evaluating the list of exemptions by way of scientific and technical progress must examine certain cases urgently. �