Life cycle of a wind turbine blade

To understand how to make wind turbine blades more circular, it is necessary to first understand what different stages exist during the life cycle of a wind turbine blade. TNO created a flow chart with seven stages that happen over the time span of 20–25 years for onshore and offshore wind turbine blades during one life cycle.

3 Stages in the EoLO HUBs project

During the EU Horizon project EoLO HUBs, we, as a consortium of partners, focus on three stages within the lifetime of a wind turbine blade. Several circular technologies are thus introduced and researched for the decommissioning stage. Furthermore, two technical hubs, one in Germany and one in Spain, are testing composite recycling technology for the end-of-life stage, and finally, we have consortium partners process the recycled material to explore new product opportunities and business cases. Click through the latest updates on these circular technologies by selecting one of the stages below. 

Beyond one life cycle

While this section focuses on circular technologies, the Transition Support Database gives more information on how to integrate circularity by design to enable and foster further end-of-life opportunities.