UK: Offshore Wind Blade Recycling Could Create 20,000 Jobs
"At-scale recycling of wind turbine blades is an important first step towards achieving a zero-carbon, zero-waste offshore wind industry and boosting the UK supply chain by 20,000 jobs, " the UK-based Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult said in a report Wednesday.
The ORE has called for increased investment and a radical shift in research and development into wind turbine blade recycling, citing the huge economic opportunities for the UK supply chain from a circular economy approach in offshore wind that could extend the sector’s UK job creation targets by a third, creating an extra 20,000 jobs.
Technically, ORE Catapult said, wind turbines are almost 85-90% recyclable, but their blades, made from composites of resins and fibers, have proven challenging to break down, process, and recycle, and remain the major hurdle to achieving fully recyclability.
According to a report which ORE Catapult produced in partnership with OGTC, and with input from experts at the National Composites Centre (NCC) and the University of Leeds, 14 technologies show promise for recovering blade materials but "further work was needed before we see them deployed at scale, particularly around issues of environmental impacts, energy use and cost-efficiency of techniques such as pyrolysis (heat treatment of composites)."
"This provides a golden opportunity for UK companies to provide solutions for our recycling needs. It is estimated that the global offshore wind industry will need to decommission 85GW of capacity (including 325,000 blades) by mid-century. While these estimates assume today’s 25-year lifecycle, they give an illustration of the scale of the future global market for circular economy pioneers in the sector," ORE Catapult said.