ATF Professional Vehicle Recycling Conference 2026 | British Motor Museum, Gaydon | 11 June 2026
The ATF Professional Vehicle Recycling Conference 2026 asked how the sector can respond to global disruption, EV growth, regulation and waste crime. Its answer was clear: vehicle recyclers must collaborate, professionalise, embrace data and AI, and think globally while protecting the practical expertise that built the industry.
The ATF Professional Vehicle Recycling Conference 2026 brought together a capacity crowd at the British Motor Museum in Gaydon for a full day of presentations themed Auto Recycling Intelligence: Shaping the Future of Vehicle Recycling. Sponsored by gold sponsor LKQ SYNETIQ, alongside B-Parts, Connected Energy, Dismantly, eBay, OHRA, Salvage Wire, Solera Hollander, SUEZ, Wickens Engineering and WILMA, the event featured one of its strongest-ever line-ups, including a welcome appearance from Minister Mary Creagh CBE MP, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at Defra, who addressed the sector on circular economy policy, battery regulation and the government’s crackdown on waste crime.
Haydn Davies, Director of ATF Professional, opened proceedings to a sold-out room, noting that the capacity crowd gathered at the British Motor Museum was itself a reflection of how far the sector’s profile has risen. Casting back to the 2022 conference, where vehicle recycling was described as entering a golden age, he argued that the conversation has fundamentally shifted. The themes of that event, from digitisation to the circular economy, are no longer emerging ideas; they are live operational challenges. With international speakers on the programme addressing everything from AI to EV battery economics to Chinese automotive strategy, his message to delegates was clear: the industry must start thinking globally, because the forces reshaping it certainly are.
Collaboration, automation and the EV challenge
Michael Hill, COO of LKQ SYNETIQ, set the collaborative tone for the morning, sharing what he described as three truths: that the industry is more important than ever, that it faces its greatest challenges, and that those challenges can only be met together. He identified five shared battles: EVs, data and digitisation, regulation, illegal operators, and trust, and argued that no single business can solve them alone.
Conrad Caine of Machines Like Me delivered the morning’s most energising session, opening with the striking claim that approximately 60% of the work carried out in a typical vehicle recycling operation is automatable today. Using the Spinning Jenny as his historical parallel, he challenged operators to embrace AI as a tool for transformation rather than threat. He warned, memorably, that “the frog doesn’t make his own pond dry.” The disruption, if it comes, will come from outside the sector.
Mark Main, partner at EY Parthenon, followed with a forensic look at the economics of EV end-of-life. His Total Cost of Ownership framework highlighted that 60–75% of EV operating costs are often hidden from traditional analyses, and his “Today versus To Scale” model clearly showed how far the UK’s infrastructure, data standards and battery-handling capability still need to travel to meet the volumes coming.
Hans Eric Melin, founder of CES Research & Consulting and known in the industry as “The Bishop,” brought his globally respected expertise in lithium-ion battery lifecycle economics to the room. His central message: value retention is the precondition for circularity. With used EV battery pack prices down by two-thirds since 2020 and European pre-processing capacity running at just 45% utilisation, the commercial case for second-life needs urgent attention. He also revealed that the average 15-year-old EV currently on UK roads has been cycled fewer than 700 times, against a designed life of up to 2,000, making these far more valuable assets than their residual values suggest.
Andrew Marsh, technical director of AutoBody Bible, rounded off the morning with what he called a provocation. Now in the seventh year of European automotive deconstruction, Marsh argued that Chinese manufacturers, with 55 million units of production capacity against actual output of around 25 million, have little incentive to build locally. His warning about Ro-Ro shipping returning full of Chinese imports and leaving with UK salvage drew a direct parallel with Brazil, where the domestic recycling market was effectively bypassed. His comments on part number documentation carried the same message: the data infrastructure underpinning European recycling was built around OEM relationships that may not extend to new entrants.
Circularity moves from theory to practice
Leon van der Merwe, Vice President for Circular Economy and Energy Business at Toyota Motor Europe, gave one of the day’s most talked-about presentations. Refreshingly candid, “I am a commercial person; I wake up every morning figuring out how to make more money”, he outlined Toyota’s Burnaston Circular Factory, a working dismantling operation applying Toyota Production System principles in reverse. The plastic legislation maths he put to the room was striking: Toyota needs plastic feedstock from 250,000 dismantled vehicles to produce one million cars per year in Europe. His message to ATFs was direct: Toyota wants to buy from the industry, not replace it. “Never more than 20% of the material should I produce myself.”
Minister Mary Creagh CBE MP, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at Defra, then took the stage for what delegates described as one of the most encouraging policy appearances the sector has seen. A Coventry MP who grew up surrounded by Alvis, Triumph and JLR, she arrived clearly briefed on the industry. The government’s Circular Economy Growth Plan, she explained, covers transport as one of six key sectors and is projected to deliver a 0.8% uplift in GDP by 2035. A cross-government Metals Circularity Group has been established to tackle supply challenges in the domestic scrap metals market, and a four-nations review of battery producer responsibility is underway, with consultation due this autumn. Areas under consideration include strengthened collection requirements, minimum recycled-content requirements, treatment targets for material recovery and consistency with the EU Batteries Regulation in Great Britain.
“When we throw it away, or export it for someone else to process, we throw away our own future,” the Minister told delegates.
On waste crime, the issue that drew the strongest reaction from the floor, she was unambiguous. Estimated to cost taxpayers at least £1 billion a year in lost landfill tax, the Environment Agency is receiving an additional £45 million over three years, digital waste tracking is being introduced, and three of the most abused permit exemptions are being removed outright, including depolluted ELVs for parts and scrap metal recovery.
The Minister said: “My risk appetite is high. When they say we could get sued or get a legal challenge, I say, studs up, let’s go in.”
Hugues Delval, CEO of Autocirc, brought a European growth story that illustrated what scale in this industry can look like. Founded less than six years ago, Autocirc now operates 70 companies across seven countries with revenues of approximately £275 million. Its insurance-led model, buying total loss vehicles in volume and supplying recycled parts back into the repair network, is already delivering 500,000 repaired vehicles per year using reused parts. Norway, where 97% of new car sales are electric, is the group’s EV laboratory. When asked if we will be seeing Autocirc in the UK, Hugues said, “No concrete plan yet. But I would say soon.”
Alan Colledge, technical director at SUEZ’s Lithium Battery Recycling Solutions, brought a dose of operational reality to the battery conversation, including a real-incident video from his own facility showing a battery entering thermal runaway without warning. With an estimated 860,000 tonnes of EV battery weight on UK roads from passenger cars alone, and a new 22,000-tonne facility opening at Wellingborough in September, he made a clear call for ATFs to become early adopters. “Things that are a cost at the moment could become a valuable commodity. But I need the volume to get there.”
Global forces, local opportunity
Paul Sell of Trend Tracker closed the formal programme with a data-rich look at the UK repair market, and its implications for the recycling sector. Rising write-offs, an ageing car parc, falling collision frequency, and the arrival of sub-£15,000 Chinese EVs are reshaping the economics of the entire aftermarket. He concluded that green parts operators are well placed in the new landscape, but only if their pricing is embedded in the data platforms that now make repair-versus-write-off decisions algorithmically. “If you’re not in the system, the decision happens without you.”
The day closed with a lively fireside chat with Vince Edivan and Shannon Nordstrom of the Automotive Recyclers Association of America, fresh from a tour of UK yards. Their account of ARA’s advocacy operation, 80 meetings on Capitol Hill in a single day, a landmark Colorado EPR win for EV batteries, offered a direct and inspiring model for the UK sector’s own engagement with Parliament. Shannon’s one-liner on why cooperation works: “A rising tide lifts all ships.”
Haydn Davies brought proceedings to a close with a clear message for delegates to take home. “We need to start thinking globally. There are factors shaping our industry that are not only happening here in the UK but across Europe and around the world. And as we look forward, we must not lose sight of the fundamental foundations that created this industry in the first place, the professionalism, the practical knowledge, the inventiveness, and the commercial instinct that have made vehicle recycling what it is today.”
The next ATF Professional event takes place in November 2026—details to follow.
Further Reading from ATF Professional
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ATF Professional announces Auto Recycling Intelligence 2026 speaker line-up and agenda focus
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The vehicle recycling industry must not wait to be invited into circularity’s inner circle
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Inside Ford Certified Used Parts: Turning reuse into a trusted choice
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Auto Recycling in Transition: Insights from IARC 2025 in Antwerp
