The outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic hit the European car market hard in 2020, with new car sales in the EU falling by almost a quarter compared to the previous year. There were also reports that fewer cars were being sent for scrapping as older vehicles remained on the road longer. Now that the first set of annual statistics for Europe on end-of-life vehicle (ELV) management is available for that period, the impact of those shifts on car recycling can be seen. According to data recently published by Eurostat, around 700,000 or 12 per cent fewer cars and light utility vehicles reached end-of-life in the EU-27 in 2020 than in 2019.
As in previous years, the majority of the resulting waste was recycled, reused or recovered. However, almost a third of the EU member states still failed to achieve the minimum recycling and recovery rate targets laid down in the EU Directive on End-of-Life Vehicles....
