Incorporating remanufacturing into the end-of-life vehicles directive : current presence and the waste problem

Within the End-of-Life Vehicles (ELV) directive, various terminology and practices are outlined to ultimately divert waste from landfill, including reuse, recycle, recovery, treatment, prevention and economic operators. Remanufacturing terminology is not explicitly stated however. Further, leading global automotive remanufacturers, have recently agreed upon a collective definition of what constitutes automotive remanufacturing. With a view to establishing remanufacturing as a stand-alone process within the ELV directive going forward, this research analyses where remanufacturing is currently situated within the ELV directive, highlighting obstacles, with a strong focus on ‘waste terminology’, of directly incorporating remanufacturing into the ELV directive and presents guidance on incorporating remanufacturing moving forward. By ignoring the concept of waste, this study found that remanufacturing processes are generally classed under reuse, recycling and recovery terminology with remanufacturing also having a tenuous relationship with treatment facilities and economic operators. In addition to highlighting the issues caused by remanufacturing spanning across recycle and reuse terminology, by incorporating waste, this research also found that automotive associations definition of remanufacturing is not able to be incorporated into the ELV directive directly. A workable solution, taking both the objectives of the ELV directive and the view of the automotive associations into consideration, was however found, and is presented in this work.