Japanese carmaker Toyota plans to lift recycled content in new vehicles ahead of expected European regulatory changes.
The company aims for new models sold from 2030 to contain at least 30% recycled material by weight on average, including parts recovered from scrapped vehicles, according to a Nikkei Asia report.
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The initiative is tied to potential updates to the EU’s End-of-Life Vehicles Directive, which could require a defined share of plastics in new cars to come from recycled vehicles, with later extensions to steel and aluminium.
Toyota currently uses roughly 20% to 25% recycled inputs, including specialist steel produced from scrap.
It intends to expand the use of recycled steel and aluminium, as well as interior plastics, and is examining whether reclaimed materials can be incorporated into body panels and engine components.
In the Prius model, steel sheet and speciality steel make up 56% of total vehicle weight, plastics account for 16%, and die-cast aluminium represents 9%.
The report says Toyota has noted that recycled steel is hard to process because its quality can vary – especially for exterior body panels – so the company is initially concentrating on parts that are easier to switch over.
The manufacturer has already begun deploying plastic recovered from end-of-life vehicles in the Crown Sport model and in the latest RAV4 SUV released in December.
It also said vehicle designs increasingly factor in dismantling and recycling, informed by surveys of dismantlers to make components and wiring looms simpler to remove.
The preparations are expected to influence a supply chain of about 60,000 companies, the report added.
Recycling plastics from scrapped cars remains limited due to complex processing, with groups such as Planic – part of Toyota Tsusho – among the few able to supply recycled automotive plastics.
In June, six Japanese companies, including Honda, Denso and Toray Industries, formed a council to encourage material reuse from end-of-life vehicles, with Toyota involved in testing and research.
