The End-of-Life Vehicles (ELV) Directive (2000/53/EC) passed into European law in October 2000. The directive was due to be transposed into national law by all member states by 21 April 2002. The UK and most other Member States missed the deadline. The UK began bringing the requirements of the directive into national law from October 2003 onwards. The directive is concerned with cars, vans, and certain three-wheeled vehicles. The Directives main requirements are to ensure that:

•  Vehicle Manufacturers (VMs) limit the use of certain hazardous substances in the manufacture of new vehicles and  automotive components and promote the recyclability of their vehicles
•  restricts the use of certain heavy metals in the manufacture of new vehicles
•  ELVs can only be scrapped at Authorised Treatment Facilities (ATF) which will operate to higher environmental  standards and have permits if they want to deal with polluted ELVs
•  requires the establishment of adequate systems for the collection of ELVs
•  states those owners must be able to have their complete ELVs accepted by these systems free of charge, even when  they have a negative value. This should apply to vehicles put onto the market on or after 1 July 2002 up to the end of 2006  and then all ELVs from 2007 onwards
•  requires producers (vehicle manufacturers or importers) to pay "all or a significant part" of the costs of take back for  complete ELVs with a negative or no value
•  requires that ELVs can only be scrapped ("treated") at authorised facilities, which must meet tightened environmental  treatment standards
•  introduces a Certificate of Destruction (CoD), which triggers the removal of a scrapped vehicle from the national register
•  requires that certain components are marked to aid recovery and recycling and that information is provided to aid  dismantling
•  sets rising reuse, recycling and recovery targets which must be achieved by January 2006 and January 2015

The UK's interpretation of the regulations follows an "own marque" approach which means the VM only needs to show evidence of treatment of its own brand ELV.

By the middle of 2005, VMs need to demonstrate to the environment agencies that they have identified an adequate ATF network to deal with their own marque ELV. The guidance is that 70% of the population should be within a 10 mile radius of an ATF.

By the end of 2006, the VMs need to demonstrate that their ATF network is able to hit the 85% target for recycling.

From 2007 onwards, the VMs are obligated to pay for any negative value ELV that arises from their ATF network. It should be noted that prior to 2007, VMs are only required to pay for negative value ELV that were registered post-July 2002.

A government consultation was issued in August 2001, the results of which are expected shortly.