A cost and benefit analysis of future end-of-life vehicle glazing recycling in France: a systematic approach

A cost and benefit analysis of future end-of-life vehicle glazing recycling in France: a system dynamics approach, " Resources, Conservation and Recycling, Each year, the lives of 8 million vehicles in Europe come to an end, of which France has a share of 1.8 million (ADEME 2008). Glass represents 2.9% of the weight of the typical European End of Life Vehicle (ELV) (ADEME 2007). It is a component of windshields, side windows and back windows. This integrated glass is generally called car glazing. Given that France alone produces 41 kg of glazing per ELV, about 70,000 tons of glazing is produced per year, not to mention the 20,000 tons of replacement glass. This is a considerable volume. The situation is exacerbated by the fact that 90-95% of this significant quantity of glass is disposed in landfills today, where it is mixed with other residues from shredding operations. The publication of the European directive number 2000/53/CE announced an important challenge to the automotive industry. This, albeit ambitious, target is imposed by the directive's attempts to reuse or recover at least 95% of the ELV weight by 2015, 90% of which is recycling (EU-Directive 2000). The recycling of ELV materials has been promoted for several years now by automotive industries across all EU countries. However, this effort in the majority of countries, including France, has been limited to materials such as steel and aluminum, and not minor wastes such as glazing (Gerrard and Kandlikar 2007). The new recycling target (95%) calls for considering glazing recycling. Clearly, a dramatic increase in the recovery of plastic, rubber, glass and other non-metallic materials will need to take place. The removal of glazing is nonetheless given explicit mention in the minimum operations obligations when ELV comes to dismantling. Sending ELV glazing to landfill does not cause serious environmental problems. It is mixed with other residues and polluted with organic material. The treatment and recycling of glass does however become difficult, expensive, and thus unfeasible. Hence, it is possible to dismantle the glass from ELV, collect and transport the glass to treatment units, purify the glass and obtain clean and reusable glass raw material called cullet. Cullet can be reused in making glass products, and is a substitute in other raw material markets. The glass production industry uses cullet to two advantages: it is relatively less expensive than raw material (Silica) and consumes less electrical energy in …