Landfill begins burying non-recyclable Wind Turbine Blades
The CRL has entered into a deal with three Wyoming wind farms to dispose of decommissioned blades and motor houses.
Waste management experts estimate they’ll take hundreds of years to biodegrade
While nearly 90 percent of old or decommissioned wind turbines, like the motor housing, can be refurbished or at least crushed, fiberglass windmill blades present a problem due to their size and strength.
“Our crushing equipment is not big enough to crush them,” a landfill representative told NPR.
Prior to burying the cumbersome, sometimes nearly 300-foot long blades, the landfill has to cut them up into smaller pieces onsite and stack them in order to save space during transportation.
To make matters worse, the blades aren’t exactly compostable. The Casper Sold Waste Manager tells Wyoming News Now they’ll take hundreds of years to biodegrade.
“So Casper happens to be, I think it is, the biggest landfill facility in the state of Wyoming. These blades are really big, and they take up a lot of airspace, and our unlined area is very, very large, and it’s going to last hundreds of years.”
As if that’s not bad enough, NPR reports researchers estimate the US will soon have to grapple with over 720,000 tons of blades over the next 20 years, “a figure that doesn’t include newer, taller higher-capacity versions.”
So much for saving the environment.
Image Credits: wyomingnewsnow.tv.
Source: Casper Regional Landfill begins burying turbine blades
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One comment mentions that there is no recycling plant big enough to recycle these blades. Couldn’t one plant be built and used to grind these up and blades reconstructed? Cannot another material be used for the blades that can be easier and cheaper to be recycled? Perhaps, ship them to an active volcano and drop them in to melt away?
Have the blades actually come to the end of their life, or is it just the most expensive parts like the generator and gearbox.
Anyone know why the turbine blades are being trashed? Seems like a colossal waste.
And how long will nuclear waste be around for, it is a lot more dangerous. Wind and solar are the only sources of energy that do not require any fuel while running and no polution while doing so, no other energy producing system has that ability.
Not true, each turbine needs a generator to turn it for any long periods of no wind. Those at see have diesel generators to keep blades turning as salt air will cause them to size up. “Really environmentally friendly!”
Thats the funniest thing i have ever heard. Where do you get your information? Obviously you are well informed. Wind alone powers the turbine, no wind, no turning of the rotor.
Theu require more energy to create then they provide smdh go read about it
Really? How much energy does it take to produce vs the 20-25 yrs of production? how much does it take to produce a nuclear power plant or a coal fired power plant or hydro? i wish people would have facts and data to back up what they say
Herb, you’re a bit of an idiot aren’t you. What about the fossil fuels required to build these atrocities. They harm birds, bats, humans. What are the bearings lubricated with ? Unicorn piss ? You’re a fossil fuel denier. Vote for Bernie it any if the other 599 Demoncrat losers.
Really, how many birds hit high rise windows or your house? How many deer get killed on highways? No mention of that? Whats the real reason you are against green energy. Do you know a main bearing takes about 15 tubes to initially pack it. After that 1-2 tubes on each annual service. Your car can use more fluids than a wind turbine
“Wind and solar are the only sources of energy that do not require any fuel while running……………….” Sorry Herb, but I have to ask, have you taken leave of your mind? I guess nobody told you how much “fuel” goes into building this wasteful junk, the energy invested vs the energy returned on the investment, or the surreal amount of petroleum, keeping those wonderful bird killers from burning up while they whirl around in the tens of thousands producing 2% or the worlds energy.
Alvin, can you tell us how much energy is consumed producing turbine components? Or what the annual energy production is of a single 4MW wind turbine? “Garbage”? I guess you are in favor of more dangerous forms of energy like coal and nuclear.. what does it take to build those? Give some facts to back up your statements otherwise you just sound foolish and disrespectful.
To say wind does not use fossil fuel is a delusion. Do some research. It takes 149 tons of coke and 350 tons of steel. It takes 20 years of full service to pay for the energy used to make it. The life expectancy of the turbine is about 20 years
That means windmill will never break even
Hey ….let’s figure out if we can make something out of them. Make houses.
Make vacation cottages. I am sure they are very strong and durable.
Could make walls and roof parts etc….
Fun Fact: From a raw materials state, it takes more energy to create a windmill than it will make in it’s operational lifetime.
I’m not sure that fun fact is relevant. I think any machine uses more energy than it produces when adding in the energy source to run it.
ABSOLUTELY….not true!!
Yeah, but all the wind people and their friends the sun people feel good so that’s the important thing. It is better to feel superior to we carbon based folk than to actually be superior. Just wait until all of those solar panels need to be trashed. But now that I think about it, who cares, because we only have 11 years to go according to Greta and Al. Live it up!
Yes! That is the nice thing about fossil fuels. The byproducts of combustion are easy to dispose of.
I live out near Mojave California. A few years ago, for months and months we would see train load after train load of these huge windmill blades, Heading North” being sent up to a wind farm near us.
We also see southbound trains with car after car filled with coal heading towards Los Angeles probably being exported to other countries.
A friend of ours works in the commercial solar business( they produce power for the utility companies). He stopped by after work with a Trailer Load of solar panels that were broken that he was taking to scrap. Apparently, these are another item that is not really repairable.
Hoping it’s only Greta and energy sucker Gore that choke on this green crap
Need to store them in an area where later on it could be refurbished or reused ,recycled in the future. There’s lots of room in the unused desert to store them.
Sounds like someone did not do their due diligence when they first came out with the idea.
“due diligence” left the scene of the crime a long time ago Jeff, leaving you and the rest of the taxpayers with the mess to clean up!
Alvin, i suppose you are ok when tax dollars are spent cleaning up chemical spills ruining lakes and rivers so i can see how wind turbines are an easy target for you. learn some facts and quit bringing people down with your negative outlook. If people took some time to learn more about green energy and knew some facts instead of jumping on the popular opinion bandwagon, they might actually support it. i have worked in the industry 11 years now, coming from the automotive industry. Trust me, automotive is far more wasteful of energy. No one questions factory power demands and other manufacturing plants energy usage. Turbines are very clean in their production. How about this, if you need some education, throw some questions my way and i will be happy to educate you
Additionally look at the carbon footprint generated in their production. Windpower is worse than power production by coal.
Worse in what aspect/regard? I dont ever recall a wind spill that decimated local water supplies and killed wildlife?
Wind turbines kill 140,000-328,00 birds per year. It is the harshest form of “green”energy. Haven’t seen the big semi trucks hauling the blades one by one? They don’t magically appear from Denmark and China where they’re manufactured into the property where they’re installed.
I have yet to see a dead bird near a windmill, have visited many. Cats kill many more birds than windmills, I think my house windows have killed more birds than the windmill I see out my window.
According to the Audubon Society, domestic cats kill almost four billion birds per year.
https://www.audubon.org/news/cats-pose-even-bigger-threat-birds-previously-thought
The Society supports green energy projects.
“Audubon strongly supports properly-sited and operated wind and solar power as renewable energy sources that help reduce the threats posed to birds and people by climate change. However, Audubon also believes wind farms and solar installations, like all forms of energy development, can and should be properly sited and operated in ways that minimize harm to federally-protected species.”
https://www.audubon.org/news/secretary-zinke-overestimates-wind-powers-impact-birds-downplays-fossil-fuels
Buildings kill hundreds of millions of birds per year.
https://www.audubon.org/news/building-collisions-kill-hundreds-millions-birds-year
Wind turbine mortality hardly rates mentioning, by comparison.
Cat kills include sparrows, doves, robins and the like. Wind turbines kill eagles, hawks, condors and other protected raptors as well endangered bats.
Where does the equipment come from for the hydro dams or nuclear power plant? How many animals are displaced from these operations? Did you know many components are now produced in the USA? Colorado. Look it up.
You’re concerned about wind turbines killing 140,000-328,000 a year? Seriously? Do you know how many birds are killed by cars and trucks a year? 340 MILLION! Do you know how many birds are killed by crashing into windows on buildings? Between 365-988 MILLION! Do you know how many birds cats kill in a year? They kill between 1.4 and 3.7 BILLION, YES, BILLION! Looks like we should be getting rid of cars, buildings and cats so we can save the birds. Looks like the turbines are much more “bird friendly”. The way some of you people think, or should I say, not think, amazes me. ♀️♀️
NFrasier, you speak at the second grade level on the topic, please inform yourself. Get informed about what supplying the earth’s population with 2% of its energy needs has done to the planet and will continue to do in the future, as Socialists who do not walk the talk, take control of YOU!
“As if that’s not bad enough, NPR reports researchers estimate the US will soon have to grapple with over 720,000 tons of blades over the next 20 years, ‘a figure that doesn’t include newer, taller higher-capacity versions.'”
10,000 times that amount of fly ash is produced by burning coal every year (75 million tons per year). Now, a good amount of that is actually used as a filler with asphalt, among other things, so 20 million tons are accounted for, leaving 55 million tons per year as waste, or about 1500 times as much waste as those turbine blades.
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Fly-ash-production-million-tonnes-year-in-different-countries-source_fig1_277309330
This doesn’t even account for the greenhouse gas production from burning coal (Two billion tons per year), or for environmental impacts from mining and transporting coal (One of the largest coal-fired plants burns three 100-car trainloads of coal per day when running at peak capacity).
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-warming/high-cost-coal/
When the carbon in coal is released as carbon dioxide, the material left behind is very concentrated. Fly ash contains mercury and other metals, including uranium and thorium. People who live downwind of coal-fired power plants receive radiation exposure that is higher than people living near nuclear power plants. A rough calculation by Oak Ridge National Laboratory estimated that the recoverable energy from the radioactive materials in fly ash could exceed the energy generated by burning the coal in the first place.
https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML0932/ML093280447.pdf
Apologies. I slipped a couple decimal points on the “10,000 times” figure. Sorry. It should have been:
“100 times that amount of fly ash is produced by burning coal every year (75 million tons per year).”
Hey Jose, what did it take to build that coal fired power plant? Little clean coal fairies? LOTS of fossil fuels and manufacturing
Send them to the moon?
do you know how much fuel you’d have to burn to do that? how much money it would cost? it would be…. astronomical.
drop them inside an active volcano?