Posted on 07/22/2023 6:57:12 AM PDT by george76
Wind turbines, once touted by the few wealthy and less populated countries as a clean solution for electricity, are now becoming an eyesore, a hazard, and a significant environmental threat.
After decades of operating around the world for the few wealthy and less populated countries, wind turbines continue to have a live expectancy of about 20 years. To date there has yet to be discovered a financially viable means of recycling those wind turbines. As a result, today’s old wind turbines are being dumped into toxic waste dumps.
Because wind turbine blades are very difficult to recycle, the waste stream created by the retired blades is a mounting problem. Globally by 2050 projections are that there will be 43 million tons of blade waste produced EVERY YEAR — the equivalent of 215,000 locomotives.
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As wind farms age, the turbines begin to break down and require maintenance. However, due to the high costs associated with removing them, many companies are choosing to leave them in place. This poses several problems, including the potential for oil leaks from the turbines, and the overall negative impact on the landscape.
The first generation of wind turbines are starting to reach the end of their service lives, while others are replaced early to make way for newer technology – including longer turbine blades that can sweep more wind and generate more intermittent electricity – the question of what to do with their huge blades becomes more pressing.
These abandoned wind turbines pose significant environmental and safety risks, as they can leak toxic chemicals and other hazardous materials into the surrounding environment and can even collapse or catch fire.
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The life cycle for renewables runs from design, procurement and construction through operations and maintenance, and repair, as well as the life ending decommissioning and disposal .. and restoration of the landscaping back to its original pristine condition.
It’s time for those few wealthy governments to “clean up” their previous subsidized programs for intermittent electricity and act to subsidize the development of methods to properly decommission wind turbines before they become a larger environmental crisis.
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Consistent with the NIMBY actions in America to reject so-called renewable electricity, Sweden shocked Europe by abandoning ‘Unstable’ Green Electricity Agenda, and returning to Nuclear Power. Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson cited the need for a more “stable electrical supply system,” pointing out the inherent instability in wind and solar electricity generating sources.
The energy crisis in Europe is collapsing as countries like the Netherlands, Czech Republic, and Greece are all beginning to realize that everything that needs electricity is made with fossil fuels and they’re reverting. They’re also recognizing that all the components of wind turbines and solar panels are made from the oil derivatives manufactured from crude oil.
In addition, Sweden’s new government has abolished state subsidies for electric cars and plug-in hybrids.
Another reality is that all the mineral products and metals needed to make wind turbines, solar panels, and EV batteries are mined and processed in places like Baotou, Inner Mongolia, Bolivia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, mostly under Chinese control. Decommissioning and restoration of those mining landscapes back to their original pristine condition is not in the cards in developing countries.
Since Germany shut down its last three remaining nuclear power plants, the country has had to turn to its neighbors to keep the lights on. Germany has gone from being an exporter of electricity to an importer.
For profitability and sustainability, private industry business decisions are based on return-on-investments (ROI) which directly relates to affordable, reliable, continuous, and uninterruptable electricity to support their investments. Thus, Germany should look at Sweden who has just abandoned the idealistic goal of occasional electricity from wind and solar and committed to nuclear for electricity that is not only continuous and uninterruptible but emission free.
It is crucial that we address this issue and find sustainable solutions for decommissioning and recycling of these wind turbines. As a society, we must prioritize responsible and safe disposal of renewable electricity infrastructure to truly achieve a sustainable future.
Shockingly, the recycling of worn-out turbine blades, solar panels, and EV batteries, in the few wealthy and less populated countries that are subsidizing intermittent electricity is not yet in the cards!
Any “thinking adult” that considers, seriously, the various methods of generating electricity will come down STRONGLY in favor of nuclear. Frankly, it will take a transition to that before EV’s will be practical on any large scale.
When Spider-man can swing from coast to coast on wind turbines it will be amazing ,LOL
there’s a reason why we bypassed windmills and electric cars as we grew...we found something better. now the goverment wants to go backwards....to prove again...why we need fossil fuels going forward.
You’re applying reality and facts to an ideologically driven non issue.(climate change)
Nuclear, natural gas, oil, and hydro should all be implemented.
EVs will never be realistic for most when factoring in battery production.
What are the requirements in lithium et al for total ICE replacement?
War and economic depression are on the horizon.
No one gives a damn about environment and feelings when society breaks down.
Tobey Maguire or Tom Holland?…
Yes.
Tobey Maguire or Tom Holland?
The stunt guy that wears the spider suit ,LOL
They never get recognition, except in Hooper.
> Any “thinking adult” that considers, seriously, the various methods of generating electricity will come down STRONGLY in favor of nuclear. <
Surprisingly, environmental scold and all-around goofball Greta Thunberg agrees with you. Last fall she came out in favor of nuclear energy. I guess the thought of winter put a little fear into her.
We drove through Texas a year back, and saw large piles and larger piles of discarded wind turbine blades. Many. Looking up details as to how they would be disposed of demonstrated to me the folly of this. Recycle? Hardy-haw.
Nuclear and Covid.
In 2008 I did my collegiate English paper on nuclear power.
I had to point to France as a model example.
This was just after getting out of the USAF and nuclear test ban treaty monitoring.
It was painful to use France…
Not knowing this about turbines is on par with not having known that masks were shown to be useless for a respiratory virus way back in 2015. Geesh, both WHO and CDC funded studies that dumped on masks.
Base load providers (e.g., dams, nukes, coal, gas, etc) have been warning about the total waste associated with turbines since the ‘80’s. PG&E actually had a humongous turbine operating out thisaway back then and paid huge sums of money getting rid of the structure. Way out of proportion compared to electricity generated and getting rid of a baseload plant.
It is a niche tech only. Kinda a vanity project.
Buried.
The standard metrics assert that they have a 20 year operational life and a 21 year payback period.
Actual data shows the average operational life is closer to 10 years.
Additionally, the "payback" calculations ignore the cost of tax incentives, do not include disposal cost, and ignore the inability to store energy, and overestimate the reliability and availability of the energy.
Did I forget to mention they have their own, significant environmental impact and are ugly?
-— “Buried.” Yup, hidden from sight.
Wind turbines already cost more energy to produce than they will generate in their lifetimes and then they produce waste that cannot be recycled. The mind numbed brain dead robots of the left have difficulty recognizing a fictitious unicorn when it appears in a mirage.
Great article, thanks.
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