EU Sees to It That When Cars Die, They Meet Their Maker
German manufacturers produced 60% of the 160 million cars now zooming along the highways and byways of Europe, and that has long been a source of pride as well as income in this automotive powerhouse.
But the very success of German auto makers is coming back to haunt them as the European Union invokes tough new ecological and recycling standards for its 15 member states.
By 2006, manufacturers based in EU nations must take back the cars they produced and pay for proper disposal once the machines have no resale value. By the same year, 85% of a scrapped car’s material must be recovered for future use.
The legal changes, which relieve a car’s final owner of responsibility for environmentally friendly disposal, are aimed at preventing illegal dumping of old cars in rivers and forests or selling them to drivers from Eastern Europe, where registration and emissions standards are lower or nonexistent.
Each year, 100,000 rusting wrecks are found abandoned on public property in EU states, and 9 million more are added to the Continent’s junkyards.
Big producers such as Volkswagen, which turned out 5 million cars worldwide last year, acknowledge the need to deal with the pollution problems rather than exporting them eastward.
“The whole idea of harmonizing end-of-life guidelines is important because all of these Eastern European countries will be EU members someday,” said Harald Fletcher, a spokesman for technology issues at VW’s headquarters in Wolfsburg, Germany. What car makers object to, he said, is being obliged to pay for a program that depends on another industry--recyclers--to develop the technology to perform effectively and at minimal cost.
German auto makers also oppose being held responsible for disposal of any car they ever produced. Lobbyists had pushed for a take-back law applying only to output after 1998, when the tougher recycling quotas were set.
“In principle, we have the possibility of challenging these guidelines, especially the retroactive aspect, [which] is of questionable legality,” said Guenter Zimmermeyer, business manager of the Assn. of German Auto Makers. “But in reality, the new regulations will probably be put into effect before we can do that.”
He worries that the preponderance of German-made cars in Europe will damage the competitiveness of the seven major producers in this country. Asian and U.S. makers won’t face the same expense of dismantling cars built before the industry was pressured into using more recyclable materials, because the foreign producers have been selling cars in Europe for only a few years.
Illegal disposal is not really a problem for Germany because this country has long required car owners to pay for disposal once their cars are no longer roadworthy. Unlike in the United States, where owners can leave unregistered cars on their property, Germans must de-register and pay a disposal fee of about $150.
But to address a continentwide problem, that cost plus investment in more efficient disposal technology will be adding to sticker prices, car makers warn.
“To say this will be done without expense to the consumer is throwing dust in the customers’ eyes,” said BMW’s recycling chief, Wolfgang Fried. He had no firm estimate of the price increases expected but confirmed that costs will go up.
In a country where drivers define themselves by their cars--even more so than in the U.S.--cost increases to cover recycling and demolition are likely to be “nothing dramatic,” said Dieter Klaus Franke of the ADAC auto club of Germany. He estimated that the extra cost at purchase will be about $100, hardly a deterrent for buyers willing to plunk down an average $30,000 for a new car.
Measured against the benefits of preventing illegal dumping and pushing pollution eastward, the cost increases and manufacturing burdens are minuscule problems, said Markus Kurdziel of Germany’s Greens party.
“What is really a problem is that there are 42 million personal cars on the roads in Germany, not the few sitting in courtyards or ditched in forests,” Kurdziel said. “These changes in disposal practices won’t make a huge ecological difference so long as the personal car is regarded as the favorite child of every German.”
Although the Greens share power in Social Democratic Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s government, they have failed to push through huge fuel tax hikes aimed at discouraging driving. Schroeder is a former member of the board at Volkswagen, and his unabashed Fahrvergnuegen--driving pleasure--reinforces his nation’s love affair with the automobile.
