Life cycle assessment of the use of decommissioned wind blades in second life applications
| dc.contributor.author | Nagle, Angela J. | |
| dc.contributor.author | Mullally, Gerard | |
| dc.contributor.author | Leahy, Paul G. | |
| dc.contributor.author | Dunphy, Niall P. | |
| dc.contributor.funder | Science Foundation Ireland | en |
| dc.contributor.funder | U.S. National Science Foundation | en |
| dc.contributor.funder | Department for the Economy | en |
| dc.contributor.funder | Invest Northern Ireland | en |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2022-07-04T14:37:02Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2022-07-04T14:37:02Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2022-01 | |
| dc.date.updated | 2022-07-04T14:15:29Z | |
| dc.description.abstract | 53,000 tonnes of blade waste from on-shore wind farms will potentially be generated in Ireland by 2040. The recycling of blades, which are made from composite material, is costly and thus far no high volume recycling solution exists. Repurposing blades into second life structures is an alternative which is gaining in popularity, but has many challenges. Green Public Procurement has the potential to help drive demand for blade products in Irish public works. The Re-Wind project has generated a Design Atlas with 47 blade product concepts and these are screened for their ability to overcome repurposing challenges. Three Irish scenarios are developed based on this ranking, maximal utilization of the blade, and on the end customer. Life Cycle Assessment is used to determine the marginal environmental impacts of the raw material substitution provided by the use of blade material. Focusing on greenhouse gas emissions, an estimated 342 kg CO2 e can be saved for every tonne of blade waste used in these scenarios. Blade substitution of steel products was found to provide the most impact, followed by substitution of concrete products. Although repurposing is unlikely to offer an end-of-life solution for all Irish blade waste, the use of 20% of this material annually would divert 315 tonnes of blade waste from landfill, as well as avoiding emissions of 71,820 kg CO2 e. Green procurement has the potential to create a demand for repurposed blade products, which in turn could create jobs in high unemployment areas. Utilization of repurposed, local material could contribute to creating resiliency in supply chains. Both job creation and supply chain resiliency are essential for a post-Covid recovery in Ireland. | en |
| dc.description.sponsorship | Invest NI/Department for the Economy (Grant no. USI-116); Science Foundation Ireland (Grant no. 16/US/3334) | en |
| dc.description.status | Peer reviewed | en |
| dc.description.version | Published Version | en |
| dc.format.mimetype | application/pdf | en |
| dc.identifier.articleid | 113994 | en |
| dc.identifier.citation | Nagle, A. J., Mullally, G., Leahy, P. G. and Dunphy, N. P. (2022) 'Life cycle assessment of the use of decommissioned wind blades in second life applications', Journal of Environmental Management, 302 (Part A), 113994 (15pp). doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2021.113994 | en |
| dc.identifier.doi | 10.1016/j.jenvman.2021.113994 | en |
| dc.identifier.endpage | 15 | en |
| dc.identifier.issn | 0301-4797 | |
| dc.identifier.issued | Part A | en |
| dc.identifier.journaltitle | Journal of Environmental Management | en |
| dc.identifier.startpage | 1 | en |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/10468/13337 | |
| dc.identifier.volume | 302 | en |
| dc.language.iso | en | en |
| dc.publisher | Elsevier | en |
| dc.relation.project | info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/NSF/Directorate for Engineering::Division of Chemical, Bioengineering, Environmental, and Transport Systems/1701413/US/Collaborative US-Ireland: Re-use and Recycling of Decommissioned Composite Material Wind Turbine Blades/ | en |
| dc.relation.project | info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/NSF/Directorate for Engineering::Division of Chemical, Bioengineering, Environmental, and Transport Systems/1701694/US/Collaborative US - Ireland: Reuse and Recycling of Decommissioned Composite Material Wind Turbine Blades/ | en |
| dc.rights | © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). | en |
| dc.rights.uri | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ | en |
| dc.subject | Wind energy | en |
| dc.subject | Wind blades | en |
| dc.subject | Repurposing | en |
| dc.subject | Life cycle assessment | en |
| dc.subject | Sustainable procurement | en |
| dc.subject | Circular economy | en |
| dc.title | Life cycle assessment of the use of decommissioned wind blades in second life applications | en |
| dc.type | Article (peer-reviewed) | en |
