52000PC0546

Proposal for a COUNCIL DECISION amending Commission Decision of 3 May 2000 replacing Commission Decision 94/3/EC establishing a list of wastes pursuant to Article 1(a) of Council Directive 75/442/EEC on waste and Council Decision 94/904/EC establishing a list of hazardous waste pursuant to Article 1(4) of Council Directive 91/689/EEC on hazardous waste

(presented by the Commission)

EXPLANATORY MEMORANDUM

1. The purpose of this Decision is to amend Commission Decision of 3 May 2000 replacing Commission Decision 94/3/EC establishing a list of wastes pursuant to Article 1(a) of Council Directive 75/442/EEC on waste and Council Decision 94/904/EC establishing a list of hazardous waste pursuant to Article 1(4) of Council Directive 91/689/EEC on hazardous waste. The amendment is proposed in light of notifications from Member States pursuant to the second indent of Article 1(4) of the Directive on hazardous waste. This Article indicates that any waste which is not listed in Decision 94/904/EC and which is considered by a Member State to display one or more of the characteristics of Annex III to Directive 91/689/EEC is a hazardous waste for the purpose of that Directive. Member States shall notify these cases to the Commission and these shall be reviewed in accordance with the procedure laid down in Article 18 of Directive 75/442/EEC with a view to adaptation of the list.

2. The Commission had submitted to the Committee, set up in accordance with Article 18 of Directive 75/442/EEC, a draft of the measures to be taken. This draft envisaged replacing Commission Decisions 94/3/EC establishing a list of waste pursuant to Article 1(a) of Council Directive 75/442/EEC on waste and Council Decision 94/904/EC by one new list. This new list included amendments necessary to incorporate 282 notifications from Member States.

On 15 December 1999 the Committee endorsed the draft on all modifications except a proposal for the modification of entry 16 01 04 discarded vehicles in Decision 94/3/EC into an entry 16 01 04 end-of-life vehicles classified as hazardous waste. As required by the procedure in Article 18 of Directive 75/442/EEC the modification of list with the exception of 16 01 04 has been adopted as Commission Decision. According to the same procedure in Article 18 a Proposal for the classification of end-of-life vehicles is submitted to the Council. If the Council has not acted within three months of the Proposal being submitted to it, the measures will be adopted by the Commission.

3. The Committee pursuant to Article 18 of Directive 75/442/EEC has already accepted a new entry 16 01 06 end-of-life vehicles, drained of liquids and emptied of other hazardous components for the new integrated waste list to be included as a non-hazardous waste.

4. The Proposal for the review of entry 16 01 04 from the Commission which was not accepted by the Committee contains two elements. The first element is proposing to use the term end-of-life vehicle in stead of discarded vehicle. This would be consistent with the terminology used in the recently adopted European Parliament and Council Directive on end-of-life vehicles. The second element is to include end-of-life vehicles in the list of hazardous waste unless the dangerous substances and components that are typically present in an end-of-life vehicle have been removed. Examples of these substances are engine, gear and lubrication oils, brake fluids and lead acid batteries, all of which are classified as hazardous waste in Decision 94/904/EC. If not removed prior to recovery or disposal, these substances will be released into the environment.

5. The Directive on end-of-life vehicles requires the removal of these substances prior to subsequent treatment. The proposed classification of end-of-life vehicles is therefore in line with and re-enforces the provisions in this Directive.

6. Several Member States were reluctant to accept the inclusion of end-of-life vehicles as hazardous waste because they anticipate problems with the management of the vehicles. It would require installations that receive these vehicles would be subject to the provisions of the Directive on hazardous waste. In particular the fact that this would require these installations to be subject to the permit system for hazardous waste was deemed problematic. The argument that an end-of-life vehicle should be classified as hazardous on the basis of the Annexes of Directive 91/689/EEC was not contested.

7. The assessment by the Commission of the arguments put forward by the Member States during the deliberations on the Commission Proposal is the following. Possible problems with the permit system cannot be accepted as a reason to consider a waste that displays the properties of a hazardous waste as a non-hazardous waste. The fact that end-of-life vehicles that contain liquids and hazardous components cause the vehicle to display hazard characteristics listed in Annex III of Directive 91/689/EEC was not contested. Therefore the Commission considers the inclusion of end-of-life vehicles as proposed to the Member States in the Committee still justified and submits a Proposal to the Council to include this waste into the list as hazardous waste.

8. The suggested date of entry into effect is 1 January 2002. This is the same date as the entry into effect of the Decision. This would allow Member States to adopt national measures for the implementation of both Decisions with one single instrument. This will facilitate the application of the measures by the Competent Authorities and the economic operators since they will in practice only be confronted with one change of legislation.

Proposal for a

COUNCIL DECISION

amending Commission Decision of 3 May 2000 replacing Commission Decision 94/3/EC establishing a list of wastes pursuant to Article 1(a) of Council Directive 75/442/EEC on waste and Council Decision 94/904/EC establishing a list of hazardous waste pursuant to Article 1(4) of Council Directive 91/689/EEC on hazardous waste

THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION,

Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community,

Having regard to Council Directive 91/689/EEC of 12 December 1991 on hazardous waste [1], and in particular Article 1(4) thereof,

[1] OJ L 377, 31.12.1991, p.20. Directive as last amended by Directive 94/31/EC (OJ L 168, 2.7.1994, p.48).

Whereas:

(1) A Community list of hazardous waste was established by Council Decision 94/904/EC [2] and this Decision has been replaced by Commission Decision.

[2] OJ L 356, 31.12.1994, p. 14

(2) Several Member States have notified end-of-life vehicles, not drained of liquids or other dangerous components as waste which they consider to display one of more of the properties listed in Annex III to Directive 91/689/EEC and have requested to list them as hazardous waste with the list set up under Article 1(4) of Directive 91/689/EEC.

(3) Article 1(4) of Directive 91/689/EEC requires the Commission to examine these notifications from Member States with a view to amending the list of hazardous wastes.

(4) The Commission is assisted in this task by the Committee established by Article 18 of Directive 75/442/EEC on waste [3].

[3] OJ L 78, 26.03.1991, p. 32

(5) The measures laid down in this Decision were not in accordance with the opinion expressed by the aforementioned Committee and could therefore not be included in Commission Decision.

(6) The procedure of Article 18 foresees that in such a case the Commission submits a proposal relating to the measures to be taken to the Council.

HAS ADOPTED THIS DECISION:

Article 1

The Annex to Commission Decision of 3 May 2000 replacing Commission Decision 94/3/EC establishing a list of wastes pursuant to Article 1(a) of Council Directive 75/442/EEC on waste and Council Decision 94/904/EC establishing a list of hazardous waste pursuant to Article 1(4) of Council Directive 91/689/EEC on hazardous waste is amended as follows.

Entry number 16 01 04 discarded vehicles is replaced by

'16 01 04* end-of-life vehicles'.

Article 2

Member States shall take the measures necessary to comply with this Decision not later than 1 January 2002.

Article 3

This Decision is addressed to the Member States.

Done at Brussels,

For the Council

The President