End of Life Vehicle Answers

We received a response from Peter Cottrell - Department for Business, Innovations and Skills

Thank you for your enquiry about end of life vehicles (ELVs) and Certificates of Destruction (CoDs). The enquiry has been passed to me for reply; the Environment Agency have provided some of the background information on enforcement of permitting requirements.

The total number of vehicles de-registered from 1 January 2009 to 31 December 2009 in the UK is estimated at 2,320,046. This covers all vehicle types including those not covered by the CoD requirements.
Vehicles are de-registered (i.e. removed from the vehicle register) for a number of reasons. Those reasons include:

a. vehicles that have been exported :

b. vehicles that have been scrapped (i.e. a CoD has been issued) and :

c. vehicle records that have been closed because the vehicle registration mark no longer relates to the vehicle concerned (cherished transfer) .

There were 1,202,593 CoDs issued from 1 January 2009 to 31 December 2009. In addition, 55,720 "unidentified" CoDs, and 24,024 Notification of Destructions (NoDs).

Although the Government has, in the past, considered the option of extending CoD requirements to other categories of vehicles, DVLA is not looking to extend the current CoD requirements . Vehicles presented to an ATF not covered by the ELV Directive can be updated on the DVLA vehicle record with an NoD.

The UK has over 1,500 licensed treatment facilities for ELVs. Last year, the Environment Agency organised four national workshops for site operators and in September provided each operator with a comprehensive information pack giving further guidance on the treatment of ELVs, preventing pollution, and compliance with environmental controls.

In April 2008, the Environment Agency launched a coordinated national campaign to tackle illegal ELV and scrap metal sites. In the first 12 months they closed or brought into regulation almost half of the 370 illegal sites that had been identified in England and Wales.

A few prosecution examples:

November 2008: illegal ELV site operator Malcolm Grange prosecuted and fined over £18,000 and made subject of a 12-month Community Order with 60 hours’ unpaid work

December 2008: illegal ELV site operator Daniel Power prosecuted and ordered to pay almost £190,000 by Swansea Crown Court under Proceeds of Crime Act legislation.

September 2009: illegal ELV site operator Christopher Brian Williams, 57, convicted at Caernarfon Crown Court in August and jailed for six months at Mold Crown Court in September.

Working in collaboration with local authorities, Police and the car recycling industry, the Environment Agency will continue to target illegal ELV sites.

In January 2010 the Environment Agency arrested four men in a raid on an Essex industrial estate. The raid was one of 30 operations the Agency was mounting to target illegal waste sites.

The estate, in Rettendon, Essex, had a history of illegal waste activities, including the unlicensed storage, deposit and treatment of scrap metal and scrap cars. Following a surveillance and intelligence gathering operation, Environment Agency officers and Essex Police visited the site, and found unlicensed skips full of waste, several hundred scrap vehicles still containing hazardous substances such as oil and brake fluid, and piles of other scrap metals.