The European Green Deal and COVID-19 recovery funds offer a window of opportunity for policymakers and industry players to act, and put the automotive industry on a transition pathway to a Paris-aligned, circular future. The value at stake for industry, society and the environment is immense: road transport accounts for 20% of Europe’s carbon emissions. To address this, the EU is conducting various important revisions of key legislations and complementary policy tools in the coming years. This report presents main policy interventions linked to specific EU “lock-in moments” – major policy revision processes – that will set the benefits of a circular automotive industry in motion.

This report was published by the World Economic Forum in collaboration with SYSTEMIQ, as part of the Circular Cars Initiative (CCI) – a partnership formed by WBCSD and the Forum to accelerate the sustainability transformation of the automotive industry. Paving the way: EU policy action for automotive circularity is the fourth in a series of reports developed by CCI to help the sector and its regulators better understand automotive’s new sustainable future.