GE, Partners Produce World's Largest Recyclable Wind Turbine

General Electric (GE), which leads a consortium of firms working on the Zero Waste Blade Research (ZEBRA) Project has manufactured the world's largest thermoplastic blade designed to serve as full-scale example of a fully recyclable wind turbine blade, Nick Lavars reported for New Atlas.

Photo Insert: The Zero Waste Blade Research (ZEBRA) Project's 62-meter (203-ft) glass-fiber reinforced thermoplastic prototype blade is the world's largest.

The thermoset composites making up today's turbine blades cannot be recycled, and one University of Cambridge study suggests that there will be 43 million tons of blade waste around the world by 2050. The ZEBRA Project is working on more sustainable materials in the form of thermoplastic composites.

The 62-meter (203-ft) glass-fiber reinforced thermoplastic prototype blade is made with Elium resin from materials company Arkema. Not only is the material 100 percent recyclable, it also performs better despite being lightweight and durable.

Through a recycling method, the material can be depolymerized and turned into a new virgin resin for re-use. In the coming weeks, LM Wind Power will start structural testing to verify the blade's performance. It will verify the recycling methods later in the year while also working on ways of recycling production waste.

“With this project we are addressing two crucial industry challenges," said John Korsgaard, senior director for engineering excellence at LM Wind Power. "On one hand, we are progressing on our Zero Waste Blades vision by preventing and recycling manufacturing waste.

On the other, we are taking blade recyclability to a new level: the end-of-life thermoplastic composite blade material has a high value in itself and can be readily utilized in other industries as material compounds but can also be depolymerized and the resin reused in the production of new blades."

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