Wyoming Wants To Fill Coal Mines With Spent Wind Turbine Blades, But Feds Won't OK Plan

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Last edited Thu Mar 16, 2023, 06:37 AM - Edit history (1)

(AP, Cowboy State Daily File)

Wyoming Wants To Fill Coal Mines With Spent Wind Turbine Blades, But Feds Won’t OK Plan

Published on March 7, 2023 -- in Energy/News/coal/wind

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By Kevin Killough, State Energy Reporter
[e-mail]

Wyoming got a clear picture of the waste challenges of wind energy in 2019 when photographs of thousands of wind turbine blades being buried at the Casper Landfill circulated the internet. ... The following year, the Wyoming Legislature came up with a disposal method that would not only get rid of used blades, but also help coal mine reclamation. Unfortunately, the plan has since been in dry dock, awaiting federal approval for nearly two years.

Two Birds, One Stone

House Bill 217, which passed during the 2020 budget session, amended Wyoming’s solid waste laws to allow the use of decommissioned wind turbine blades and towers as backfill as part of approved coal mine reclamation plans.

“The idea was that, since we have the rail lines going to the mines, we could accept this waste from the wind industry and use it for some backfill to help lower reclamation costs,” Travis Deti, executive director of the Wyoming Mining Association, told Cowboy State Daily.

Under the law, the wind companies pay coal companies for the blade disposal, the state gets a cut of the fees and the large turbines don’t clog local landfills across the nation.

{snip}

[Lulu KC]

1. I wonder why

It doesn't sound like something this administration would not want to move forward. The article just reads like an anti-Biden administration piece--"sitting on it" just doesn't sound right.

[brush]

2. Aren't they metal that can be scrapped for their value?

Seems a waste to just bury them.

[dutch777]

3. yeah! But maybe they are significantly fiberglas

wonder what makes them "spent"....stress maybe?

[moose65]

4. I think they're fiberglass

So I don't think recycling is an option.

I suppose that after so many years of operation, the stress is too much to repair? I don't really know - just speculation.

[Caribbeans]

6. Newly Discovered Chemical Process Renders All Existing Wind Turbine Blades Recyclable

February 8, 2023, by Adrijana Buljan

A new chemical process discovered as part of a Vestas-led project removes the need for changing the design or composition of the material used for wind turbine blades to make them recyclable as it allows for epoxy-based blades to be broken down into raw material that can be reused to make new wind turbine blades or used for other purposes...
https://www.offshorewind.biz/2023/02/08/newly-discovered-chemical-process-renders-all-existing-wind-turbine-blades-recyclable/

Wind Turbine Giant Says It Has a Solution That Will Keep Blades Out of Landfills
Bloomberg Feb 7, 2023
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-02-08/vestas-says-wind-turbine-recycling-solution-to-keep-blades-out-of-landfills

Once upon a time the United States could build an interstate highway system connecting Miami to Seattle while simultaneously launching space capsules that took Americans to the moon.

Does it make any sense that - with study and innovation - fiberglass wind turbine blades could not be recycled?

Just a few weeks ago Congress was patting itself on their backs after giving $100+ BILLION DOLLARS to a nation 8,000 miles away for war toys that will never ever provide a thing besides killing. Perhaps they could have made it $99 BILLION and kept a BILLION DOLLARS to research stuff like recycling fiberglass?

[NNadir]

7. If one were to have a modicum of a scientific education...

...as opposed to promoting 50 year old pablum over and over and over, one would understand the chemical and energy risks associated with reprocessing massive quantities of waste associated with short-lived junk.

If one doesn't have such a modicum, one substitutes intellectually lazy and morally vacuous wishful thinking for the promotion of doing nothing but advocating for more waste of resources and energy with insipid handwaving and denial.

The hand waving that's almost as old as handwaving about a putative "hydrogen economy," wishful thinking now about half a century old, specifically the wishful thinking that recycling plastics would make them clean and sustainable, has resulted in micro and nano plastics being present in almost every living organism on this planet.

Similarly the wind energy fantasy has left us with a concentration of the dangerous fossil fuel waste of around 421 ppm as of today, less than ten years after we first saw levels at 400 ppm.

The wind industry is not sustainable but the good news is that Germany is digging lots of holes to dig out filthy lignite, meaning they'll be able to provide lots of turbine blade dumps in the wasteland they'll be leaving future generations.

[Finishline42]

5. Looking at the picture - looks like all the metal has been removed.

Blade ends are open.

Guessing on what makes them spent...

Wear on the leading edge

Newer design generates more energy?

Blade diameter keeps increasing. Doubling the diameter increases output by a factor of 3.