On April 25, major blade manufacturers, including LM Wind Power, announced their joint commitment to create blade material passports, following the release of a new specification by the DecomBlades Innovation project, for recycling partners to recycle blade material.

The blade manufacturers are calling for this document to become a standard for the wind power industry.

Today, there is a market for recycling most of a wind turbine, but there has not been a market for the composite that makes up the blades.

The DecomBlades innovation project addresses this with a new blade material passport, making it easier to dismantle and recycle the blades.

John Korsgaard, Senior Director, LM Wind Power and Chair of DecomBlades Consortium, explains:

“The wind industry strongly supports the development of viable value chains for recycling blades. With the commitment to provide blade material passports, we hope to accelerate the establishment of a viable market for recycling blades. The information in the blade material passport will be valuable for blade recycling companies and will help them enhance their process efficiency. We need to work together to industrialize the blade recycling sector, enabling 100% blade recycling in the future,”.

The material passports were developed by mapping out the composition of the blades of three major blade manufacturers: Siemens Gamesa, LM Wind Power, and Vestas, all involved in the DecomBlades innovation project.

Other companies, including Nordex Group, Enercon and GE Vernova, are planning to join this initiative aimed at implementing standardized material passports in the wind industry.

Once mapped, the data has formed the basis for a standardized recommendation for blade material passports, which includes what materials are used in the blades and where they are situated. This makes it is easier for recycling companies to separate the blades and recycle the parts.

Download the LM Wind Power blade material passport here: LM 37.3 P2, 1.5- 2 MW

Examples of material passports from other partners can be downloaded at www.decomblades.dk.

Committing to provide a service for legacy products

The European wind power industry has called for a landfill ban on blades in Europe by 2025. To support implementation of the landfill ban, a group of major blade manufacturers have voluntarily committed to provide a material passport as a service for their products.

These material passports will be available on the company websites for representative blade models within each MW category that are nearing their expected decommissioning date. These material passports will be representative for many blades that are built in the same way but come in different sizes.

The companies committing to this service will use recommended content from the DecomBlades material passport to provide recycling companies with a concise, clear, and recognizable format for receiving information about blade materials that supports recycling.

Read the full press release here.