Did you think old cars just ended up “on the dung”? Almost all the material in discarded cars is actually recycled.
The first thing that happens when you deliver your car for wrecking is that the car is environmentally cleaned. It involves removing hazardous liquids and waste from the car, such as engine oil, coolant, batteries, catalyst and more. This is processed, sold or reused directly.
Then the car is squeezed flat and goes into a “shredder” where it is torn into pieces. The pieces are then sorted by type: aluminum, steel, plastic, glass and so on. These can then be sold as raw material and included in new products.
A small proportion of materials remain in the end. This goes to energy recovery through combustion.
In the future, propulsion batteries such as electric and hybrid cars will eventually be a component of most cars, and this represents a new challenge – and new opportunities – for the industry. See here how Batteriretur AS envisages the potential for reuse and recycling.