C5 - Recycling/reuse of composites
C - Materials and Manufacturing
Challenges/Opportunities
Composites, glass fibre in particular are currently not easily recycled. Very large amounts of composites will come out of service posing an environmentally unacceptable situation ??? current practice is to land-fill decommissioned blades.
Solution
With a number of offshore wind turbines approaching their end of service life, investigation of appropriate end of life scenarios becomes a timely priority.
Context and Need
A large number of first-generation wind turbines are entering the second half of their service life. Service life extension and repowering can reduce LCoE, however materials used in decommissioned blades in particular need to be reused/recycled.
Summary
A large number of first-generation wind turbines are entering the second half of their service life. Service life extension and repowering can reduce LCoE, however materials used in decommissioned blades in particular need to be reused/recycled. New research is needed to investigate methods to repurpose and/or recycle composites for offshore wind and marine renewables.
Impact Potential
Expected potential impact is high for OPEX through repowering and life extension. However, it will become unacceptable for the industry not to tackle a growing major unrecyclability issue.
Research Summary
Some disparate research work is underway by individual investigators but there is no concerted programme for the recyclability of composites for marine applications.