China has delivered its first recyclable thermoset wind turbine blade, marking a key advance in solving one of the renewable energy industry’s biggest sustainability challenges: what to do with retired turbine blades.
Source: Science and Technology Daily
China has delivered its first recyclable thermoset wind turbine blade, marking a key advance in solving one of the renewable energy industry’s biggest sustainability challenges: what to do with retired turbine blades. Developed by Zhuzhou Times New Material Technology (TMT), a subsidiary of CRRC Corporation, the TMT82 blade has officially shipped from the company’s Sheyang factory and is now ready for deployment. This is the first blade of its kind in China that allows for effective separation and recovery of both resin and fiber materials—a milestone in building a circular economy for wind energy.
At 82 meters long, the TMT82 is designed for large-scale wind turbines and offers a swept area of over 21,000 square meters, roughly equal to three football fields. The blade uses a recyclable thermoset resin combined with glass fiber composites and features an aerodynamically optimized, aircraft-wing-inspired profile to maximize energy capture.
Traditional wind turbine blades are made with standard thermoset resins, which are chemically crosslinked and cannot be melted down or repurposed. As a result, most retired blades are incinerated, landfilled, or mechanically crushed—solutions that are both costly and environmentally damaging.
TMT’s solution lies in a reversible chemical bond system. “We’ve developed a resin that maintains the strength of traditional epoxies but allows for selective depolymerization, enabling the resin to be chemically separated from the fibers at end-of-life,” said Chen Huang, Deputy Director of TMT’s Wind Product Development Center.
The environmental upside is significant. A single 4MW wind turbine equipped with TMT82 blades can generate up to 10 million kWh per year, enough to power 4,000 homes. When decommissioned, the blade can be dismantled under mild conditions, and the recovered resin reused in applications such as epoxy flooring and hand lay-up resins.
Perhaps most importantly, carbon emissions over the blade’s full life cycle are reduced by more than 26% compared to traditional blade materials. “This not only helps reduce landfill waste but also cuts the risk of harmful gas emissions during disposal,” Chen added.
As global wind fleets mature, blade disposal is becoming an urgent environmental concern. Innovations like the TMT82 could help set new industry standards for recyclability, closing the loop on wind power manufacturing and helping to make the sector truly sustainable.
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