Auto Recycling Project Details
The Auto Recycling effort aims to reduce the environmental impact of end–of–life vehicles (ELVs). Sustainable Conservation is working to decrease the amount of polluted stormwater runoff and mercury released into the environment, the two most significantly damaging by–products of ELVs.
While auto recyclers keep hundreds of thousands of ELVs and their accompanying fluids out of landfills, many operators can inadvertently contribute to polluted runoff. Toxic substances such as metals, oils, and coolants can be flushed into rivers and streams, eventually ending up in public water sources.
Mercury is one of the most destructive substances found in auto recycling runoff and is found in cars, both in the interior lights switches and the interior trunk opening mechanism. When mercury is not removed from vehicles before they are crushed, it is released into the environment, where it contaminates air, groundwater, and even fish.
With scant local resources and more than 150 licensed auto recyclers in Northern California, regulation alone cannot solve the problem; regulations must be accompanied by enforcement. As the majority of auto recyclers are "mom–and–pop" operations, continuing with business as usual is easier and cheaper than making procedural or structural adjustments.
Adding to the problem are a large number of illegal operators who dismantle vehicles and sell parts without proper licenses, operate without threat of inspections, and have little or no understanding of their environmental impacts. Auto dismantlers need to have both the resources and incentives to modify their business practices.
Since the launch of the Auto Recycling project in 2001, Sustainable Conservation established the country's first collaboration between auto recyclers, government agencies, and environmentalists working to address the problem of polluted runoff. Sustainable Conservation has also created and distributed bilingual educational materials on storm water management to auto recyclers throughout California, and introduced affordable structural alternatives to contain hazardous materials.
A leading authority on mercury switch removal, Sustainable Conservation is educating dismantlers on how to safely store and dispose of mercury from ELVs. A plan is currently underway to create a mercury switch removal project with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the California Department of Toxic Substances Control, and Pick Your Part (a large auto dismantling facility in Hayward), to instruct local dismantlers how to safely remove mercury from vehicles. Sustainable Conservation will also support a legislative initiative to assess a fee on new vehicles to fund both incentives for auto dismantlers and greater enforcement of environmental regulations against illegal dismantling operations.
