Closing the Loop on Automotive Plastics
Background and Regulatory Context
Every year, more than 800,000 tonnes of plastic from end-of-life vehicles (ELVs) are incinerated or sent to landfill across Europe. Currently, closed-loop recycling — returning plastic from scrapped cars back into new vehicles — accounts for just 2.5% of recycled plastic used in EU vehicle manufacturing, against a baseline requirement of 5% under incoming rules. The EU’s new End-of-Life Vehicles Regulation, agreed in December 2025, sets binding targets requiring new cars to contain at least 15% recycled plastic within six years and 25% within ten, with at least 20% sourced from ELV closed-loop streams. The pressure is global: China processed nearly 8 million ELVs in 2024 and is building national circular economy targets; Japan operates the world’s most mature ELV recycling system; and US automakers including Ford and GM are pursuing voluntary recycled content targets ahead of federal policy.
The Pilot: What Was Done
The Global Impact Coalition (GIC) convened eight chemical and waste industry companies — BASF, Covestro, LG Chem, LyondellBasell, Mitsubishi Chemical Group, SABIC, SUEZ, and Syensqo — to conduct the first automotive plastics recycling pilot initiated by the chemical industry. Between January 2025 and February 2026, the pilot processed 100 end-of-life vehicles through a complete dismantling, shredding, and sorting chain in the Netherlands. Rather than shredding whole vehicles, the consortium used excavator cranes to extract over 35 components per vehicle, grouped parts into 22 polymer streams, shredded them separately, and sorted the output using advanced optical screening technology targeting 15 polymer types. The pilot recovered approximately 8 metric tonnes of plastic material — over 50% of the plastic content per vehicle.
Key Findings
The pilot confirmed that recovering recyclable plastics from ELVs is technically feasible, but the fundamental barrier is not technology — it is coordination and cost. No single actor in the chain holds both the incentive and the capability to build a functioning system unilaterally. OEMs control material specifications but lack dismantling infrastructure; dismantlers focus on metal recovery with no reliable return on plastic investment; waste managers lack feedstock volumes to justify dedicated sorting facilities; and chemical companies need consistent, large-scale supply chains that do not yet exist.
On cost, dismantling and processing currently runs well above what is economically viable, requiring cost reductions of up to 75% per kilogram to make the business case work. On material quality, paint residues, multi-material components, and mixed polymer contaminants reduced usable polymer yields below expectations. Pre-treatment before shredding is essential for several component categories, particularly bumpers.
The Path Forward
The report identifies a complementary recycling model: mechanical or chemical recycling for sorted, clean polymer streams, and gasification for contaminated residue fractions. Near-term operational improvements include optimising dismantling workflows, co-locating mobile shredding with dismantling sites, and developing open-access polymer composition databases to support dismantlers currently working without material data. Longer-term, the report calls on OEMs and chemical companies to agree shared quality specifications for recycled automotive plastic, and for collective ecosystem investment to consolidate feedstock volumes and align incentives across the value chain. Phase 2 of the GIC project, now underway, will focus on building a commercially viable business model and identifying the key multi-stakeholder commitments required to scale circular automotive plastics within the decade.
www.globalimpactcoalition.com/gic-automotive-plastics-circularity-pilot-report/