How to recycle a wind turbine in a test tube

Wind turbine blades are huge, strong and hard to recycle. As the world's use of wind energy grows, researchers are searching for better ways to make use of old, decommissioned wind turbine blades. Now researchers in Denmark are using chemistry to find ways to break down the tough epoxy plastic that make up the blades, and recover useful materials for producing future wind turbines.
Read the paper: www.nature.com/articles/s4158...

[@scottread]

Looks promising!

[@Petch85]

Can we maybe repair them and reuse them to make more energy thereby reducing the number of new blades needed?

[@ConnorRoss]

i imagine they can design more efficient blades now and so replace them. im sure it all calculated but no doubt there is a lot of waste in most industries.

[@shabinthegreat]

But ... where is the money in doing that?
Follow the .... Money!

[@Petch85]

@@shabinthegreat I guess when it can work for cars, it can work for wind turbines. You have an old turbine where the blade is damaged, in stead of scrapping the full turbine, you could bay some refurbished blade, maybe with some vortex generators to improve efficiency, og now you can run your turbine for another 10 years or something.
Just a you can bay a new set of brakes, shocks etc. for your car.

[@ericlotze7724]

In my Opinion, just shredding them, running it through an “Entrained Flow Gasifier” then remelt the slag into new fiberglass/rokwool would be more efficient/less complex.
Granted I’ll need to watch the video later + read the paper

[@user-bu1ix6tg9o]

energy use for entrained flow gasifier is very high, and the slag reprocessing would be inhibitivley expensive. gasification is best suited for coal and other less chemically complex organic feedstocks instead of this.

[@NukeDoggyDog]

"Days" of heat? And where will all that heat come from? (Let me guess - natural gas.) And at what cost?

[@j121212100]

energy intensive not a problem if the reaction occurs in an industrial sized thermos.

[@justineseman3741]

so.. turbines are made out of epoxy?

[@Aksakal1917]

@2:27 hey izmir, my hometown :D

[@Neront90]

But funding this and building this non-recyclable blades surely feel good.

[@deathbykindnes]

about damn time xp

[@wassaybosanyt9917]

I don't know why people will just decide to waste their time reading my comment when clearly I have nothing to say.
And this person is still reading it

[@tinoparimson]

Unfortunately, "green energies" aren't green yet!

[@Muonium1]

Why exactly would it be a good idea to be shredding old wind turbines to put in concrete (where it will inevitably become microplastics that get dispersed into the environment) and be used for CHILDREN'S PLAYGROUNDS if it intrinsically contains vast amounts of bisphenol-A?? And more importantly, why am I, and not the science journal reporting on these things addressing such an obvious glaring problem?

[@pablovirus]

Because the video is 3:42 mintues long.

[@Muonium1]

@@pablovirus in case you hadn't noticed, there are ten+ hour long videos on here

[@pablovirus]

@@Muonium1 you are grossly misunderstanding the purpose of this PR video. It's not MEANT to address every minor detail or possible complaint. There are technical reports and scientific papers for that. You are essentially complaining at the void here.

[@flowerdiary9689]

Gm ☕☀

[@5eZa]

exactly WHAT CHEMICAL... pointless report. also could you narrate any slower possibly? watch on 1.75 speed. or better yet don't watch at all, for best experience

[@dos7.11]

views be like: 📉📉📉📉📉📉📉📉

[@ropro9817]

Lol, ironic that they didn't consider the full lifecycle of wind turbines when they were invented.

[@28th_St_Air]

As if there is any other form of energy production that was designed to have a zero impact life cycle. Get real.

[@doxielain2231]

(Looks to high level nuclear waste from nuclear power plants)