A new lease of life for Britain’s blades
New research from the Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult suggests significant life extension possibilities for turbine blades.
The prolific expansion of onshore and offshore wind across Britain over the last two decades is an unparallelled renewable energy success story, with turbine sizes and outputs rapidly increasing and costs dropping dramatically. The contribution these technologies have made to the UK’s Clean Energy Mission, energy security and decarbonisation efforts is worthy of recognition and significant praise.
However, with some of the earliest models of wind turbines now approaching the end of their intended 20 year operating life spans questions arise about what happens next. The current generation of wind turbines are now being deployed with fully recyclable blades, but older models face challenges in decommissioning and recyclability.
The latest testing research from the Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult, in partnership with leading wind power company RWE, has demonstrated options that could extend the life of the existing blades – in some cases by up to half their expected lifetime again.
With more than 500 offshore wind turbines in UK waters due to reach the end of their original intended lifespan in the next five years, this research comes at a critical juncture for wind farm operators, and could result in both onshore and offshore wind farms running for much longer than originally envisaged. With the pressing need to bring ever-more renewables online, life extension of blades could ease headaches in Westminster and Whitehall about restructure of the grid for new connections and replacement of lost generating capacity through decommissioning.
It will also ease anxieties about the circular economy in offshore wind, on which ORE Catapult is also leading pioneering research to improve recyclability of materials and reduce waste going to landfill through the CEWS programme. This programme looks to raise awareness of the added value of circular economy approaches for offshore wind; develop strategic responses to the forecasted steeply rising levels of criticality of materials on which offshore wind growth is dependent; and identify business opportunities and circular business models to increase the sustainability potential of offshore wind.
By delaying the point at which blades need to be decommissioned allows burgeoning technologies in this field to mature and reach commercial readiness, meaning that we’ll be better prepared to deal with them when they eventually reach their extended end of operational life.
The physical blade testing for this research was carried out at ORE Catapult’s world-class test facility in Blyth where ORE Catapult engineers replicated the real world conditions faced by a 20-year-old turbine blade and sped up the ageing process in a controlled environment. Testing showed that, with targeted adaptations and solutions in place, a blade’s operational life can be significantly extended. If adopted sector-wide, this approach could complement repowering efforts for turbines already undergoing life extension, delivering cost savings for consumers while safeguarding and sustaining domestic clean energy production.
With Allocation Round 7 in full swing and cost-pressures on developers and operators of wind farms testing the economic models of CfD bids, life extension of blades and components to repower existing wind farms could be a potent tool for government to wield in the race to secure increasing amounts of wind power within the UK’s energy mix.
Where there is room for government action is in derisking the economics of life extension and repowering projects; where CfDs have lapsed, significant risk on insurance and market energy pricing is borne by operators. A designated ring-fence within future allocation round processes would provide market certainty for investments in life extension.
Failure to support this part of the market could lead to many more blades with a remaining usable life-span being destined for the scrap heap, leaving their potential unfulfilled and UK energy production the worse for it.
