This research project will help make the wind industry more sustainable by developing recyclable wind turbine blades using vitrimer composites.
There is a significant amount of waste generation expected due to the possible decommissioning of thousands of wind turbines nearing their end of life in Europe in the coming years.
Despite efforts to maximise the amount of these blades being recycled, a large proportion of the first-generation wind turbine blades are disposed of either in landfills or by incineration.
This means there is a need to develop wind turbine blades that have longer service lives and more sustainable end-of-life scenarios.
The project
EOLIAN aims to develop wind blades with a longer lifetime, better maintainability and reliability, and improved sustainability and recyclability.
To achieve these goals, EOLIAN proposes bio-based repairable and recyclable wind turbine blades consisting of vitrimer composites and basalt fibres.
Selection of vitrimers with properties and chemistry suitable for the application will be performed.
The process of vitrimer selection and characterisation, and fabrication of the vitrimer composites will be parallelly assisted at every step by developing a multi-scale model ranging from the molecular scale up to actual sample scales.
The integration of recyclable sensors and heating actuators within the blades during manufacturing will increase their functionality and maintainability.
Once the vitrimer composites are fabricated, recovery of their original constituents will be demonstrated by chemical and mechanical recycling techniques.
The development of 2nd generation composites using the recovered materials will be undertaken next.
Research impact
Overall, this project, through the development of recyclable wind turbine blades using vitrimer composites, will solve the long-standing issue of disposal of wind turbine blades after their service lifetime and help in making the wind industry more sustainable and environmentally friendly.
EOLIAN will help usher in a new generation of wind turbine blades which are superior to existing blades in recyclability and repairability.
This will provide superior environmental, economic and social benefits compared to current solutions.
The integration of sensors and actuators within the blades will benefit wind turbine operators to monitor the blades regularly and diagnose issues before they become critical.
The environmental advantages of recyclable blades will help create a circular economy.
Our collaborative partners
- Proplast
- ZRL Energy
- Norvento Technologia, S.L.
Meet the Principal Investigator(s) for the project
Dr Mihalis Kazilas - Dr Mihalis Kazilas is the Director of the Brunel Composites Centre. He has more than 20 years of experience in the composites processing area. He received his PhD in Advanced Materials from Cranfield University back in 2003. His main field of expertise are polymers characterisation and polymer composites manufacturing and joining processes. He is author of several refereed scientific publications in the area of advanced composites manufacturing and process optimisation. Mihalis is a creative thinker who enjoys problem solving and able to work with different stakeholders to achieve the optimum results in both technical and managerial environments.
Work experience:
Sep 2019 – present: Business Group Manager, Polymer and Composite Technologies, TWI, UK
June 2019 – present: Director of the Non-Metallics Innovation Centre, a joint initiative between TWI, Saudi Aramco and ADNOC
Oct 2016 – present: Centre Director, Brunel Composites Innovation Centre, Brunel University London, UK
Feb 2012 – 2019: Section Manager, Adhesives, Composites and Sealants (ACS) section within the Joining Process Group at TWI, UK
May 2006 – Jan 2012: R&D Consultant, Project Engineer, Collaborative Projects Operations Manager at INASCO, Greece
Related Research Group(s)
Brunel Composites Centre - Shared research and technology capabilities, specialising in novel composites processing and joining technologies applied to industrial environments.
Partnering with confidence
Organisations interested in our research can partner with us with confidence backed by an external and independent benchmark: The Knowledge Exchange Framework. Read more.
Project last modified 05/09/2024