Funded by UK Research and Innovation’s ‘UK Regulatory Science and Innovation Networks’ (RS&IN) funding call, the ‘Regulations to Ensure Sustainable Circular Use at End-of-life for Wind’ (RESCUE) Project was was established to determine the need and/or desire to identify current gaps and challenges for end-of-life materials management and processing, to support progress towards a more circular economy for the wind sector.

ORE Catapult leads the ongoing project, in partnership with the University of Leeds, the University of the West of England, the University of Birmingham, EMR and Ionic Technologies. The partners identified the need for a well-established end-of-life supply chain, becoming increasingly important due to the UK’s earliest wind turbines approaching the end of their expected operational lifespans.

Discovery Phase

In 2024, the discovery phase engaged stakeholders from across industry, supply chain and regulators to identify priorities, map the policy and regulatory landscape and review governance challenges. Through the work completed during the discovery phase, the partners established the groundwork for a broad network of stakeholders to identify challenges and opportunities within the circular supply chain, as well as a collaborative forum to explore solutions.

Implementation Phase

Following the completion of the 6-month discovery phase project, the RESCUE project was awarded follow-on ‘Implementation Phase’ funding to build on the work carried out during the discovery phase, deliver solutions to the findings and to establish a comprehensive and robust end-of-life materials network for the wind sector, centred on the topics of waste regulation, navigation of the regulatory landscape and standardisation activities.

 

 

WP1 – Project management

• Network Management and Governance​
• Legal, IP and Risk management
• Formal Project Reporting​

 

WP2 – Resources and waste regulations

Research how resource and waste regulations are intended and actually working, including:

• Develop a public database of policies, regulations and governance actors for a circular economy for onshore and offshore wind
• Investigate potential regulatory bottlenecks and solutions
• Gap analysis for integration of resources and waste regulations in end of use governance
• Case studies to identify regulatory best practice and co-produce guidelines

 

WP3 – Navigation of Regulatory landscape

Review of how current practices and innovation interact with the regulatory conditions in which they are deployed and developed. By investigating decommissioned project and wind farm end of use management to provide an understanding of how potential bottlenecks affect the emergence of new sustainable models and approaches for the wind supply chain such as waste prevention, life extension, reuse and recycling.

• Interviews with wind industry actors and academic experts
• Review of regulatory complexity and variability of implementation​
• Review of regulatory costs and barriers to innovation​
• Review of planning consent and infrastructure development​

 

WP4 – Knowledge sharing and regulator engagement

• • Regulator Communication and Engagement​
  • Development of Proposal for a Regulatory Sandbox​
  • Preparation of policy brief with Green Alliance
  • Standarisation Activities and Engagement with Standardisation Bodies​

 

WP5 – Capacity building and dissemination

As part of the implementation phase, the RESCUE network hosted workshops across the UK to enable diverse participation of stakeholders that would capture the variability in the development and implementation of regulations across. To ensure regional coverage, the network hosted four workshops across the four UK home nations.

1. London 10^th March 2025 – Click here to download the slidepack.
2. Belfast 1^st April 2025 – Click here to download the slidepack.
3. Glasgow 13^th May 2025 – Click here to download the slidepack. 
4. Newport 20^th May 2025 – Click here to download the slidepack.

 

The network heard from stakeholders and held discussions about the barriers and possible solutions to the regulatory and policy challenges experienced on the path to a circular economy for the wind sector.

Further activities aim to grow the network so that collaboration will continue beyond the 12 month funding for the implementation Phase.

A programme of training and development will progress knowledge sharing initiatives and raise awareness of findings from the project

Next Steps

Over the next 10 months we aim to prepare:

• Publicly accessible database of policies, regulations, and governance studies and their roles in wind turbine end of use management with narrative summary​
• Co-produce guidelines on the role of diverse environmental regulators
• Case study report with recommendations for implementation of resources and waste regulations,
• A series of case studies demonstrating challenges or best practice for end-of-life component or material processing.
• Recommendations for integrating resources and waste regulation in wind turbine end of use guidelines​
• Host Regulatory roundtable on best practice and guidelines for the application of waste regulations.
• Report on barriers, challenges and recommendations for navigating the regulatory landscape, both for industry and for regulators,
• Contributions towards standardisation activities,
• Regulatory sandbox proposal, to pilot possible solutions,
• Summary policy brief, in collaboration with Green Alliance.

 

RESCUE Network Directory

Download the RESCUE Network Directory here