In line with the tightening up of Best Practice conditions that sites with Environmental Permits must operate under, the EA has issued a consultation on the application of Appropriate Measures for End of Life vehicle dismantlers.
It is likely that most licensed facilities will struggle to comply and many will be required to spend considerable amounts of money to meet some of the conditions. Those that don’t comply will have three years to implement the necessary measures.
However, given that this is one of those waste sectors where there are more unlicensed facilities than licensed, – the Vehicle Recyclers Association estimate 3,000 unlicensed versus 2,000 licensed – it is questionable as to how much difference this will make without significant enforcement as it will become even more difficult for licensed facilities to compete with those that operate outside regulation.
The VRA believe that nearly 30% of the 1.75m vehicles scrapped each year bypass the legal processes. In a recent press article, they state that ‘Since 2008, enforcement has deteriorated and is virtually non-existent’. It will therefore be interesting to see how much difference these new measures make.
Sectors to which Appropriate Measures have already been applied include:
- Chemical waste – 18 November 2020
- Non-hazardous and inert waste – 12 July 2021
- Treating metal waste in shredders – 20 October 2021
- WEEE and Waste Cooling Equipment – 11 May 2022