Circular Economy for the Wind Sector (CEWS)

Published 22 January 2025

The offshore wind sector is fast approaching the point where the earliest wind farms in the UK and across Europe will be decommissioned. With this major milestone, there are several key considerations around the supply chain readiness to handle the materials arising in the most environmentally sustainable manner.

To address this industry challenge, ORE Catapult has established the Circular Economy for the Wind Sector (CEWS) to reduce waste from wind farms; ensure UK/European capacity for recovering materials from decommissioned turbines; identify strategic weaknesses in port and vessel capacity at critical locations and get ahead of the curve for the environmental permitting of subsea component removal.

As part of this project, ORE Catapult aims to lead and facilitate the development of industry best practice and the supporting tools for the detailed understanding of “true” end-of-life potential for pilings, to reduce the environmental and ecological impacts. In addition to the reuse, recycling, or sustainable disposal of decommissioned offshore wind turbines, CEWS aims to lay the foundations of a new circular economy supply chain for the sector, allowing wind turbine components to be disposed of in the best possible way.

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The project will focus on four key areas:

Logistics: Reduce waste from wind farms
Traceability: Ensure UK/European capacity for recovering materials from decommissioned turbines
Supply Chain: Identify strategic weaknesses capacity at critical locations
Strategy: Get ahead of the curve for the environmental impacts of decommissioning and subsea component removal

The CEWS Joint Industry Partnership

The CEWS Joint Industry Partnership (JIP) officially launched with partners in 2023, delivering three key programme outputs. From January 2025, ORE Catapult has opened the CEWS JIP to any organisation within the wind sector, with the aim of uniting the wind energy supply chain to develop sustainable practices.

Membership

By joining the CEWS JIP, members can access our industry-leading Turbine Recycling and Circular Economy (TRACE) Tool, non-public industry reports and receive a bespoke business report or case study tailored to your organisation’s specific needs.

Moreover, members will have the opportunity to guide the CEWS programme direction and attend in-person networking workshops.

Join the CEWS JIP to help us to maximise resource efficiency and minimise environmental impact. Contact circular@ore.catapult.org.uk for more membership information.

CEWS PHASE 3 SUMMARY REPORTS

ONSHORE LOGISTICS SUMMARY REPORT

This report examines the onshore logistics necessary to support offshore wind farm decommissioning, providing an assessment of the requirements for UK port capabilities and infrastructure.

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PREVIOUS CEWS PROJECTS & CASE STUDIES

End of Life Materials Mapping for Offshore Wind (ELMWIND)

In collaboration with key stakeholders, ORE Catapult will develop knowledge of the wind industry components, their population (current and forecasted), estimated material constituents and their end of life route map for recycling, reuse, refurbishment or disposal strategies. This industry intelligence is envisaged to lead the sector towards making key decisions required for circular economy by enabling effective economical and environmental end of life decisions. It will also support the development of supply chains and technologies by providing realistic, robust data and insights into the materials used by the industry and forecasts of their end of design life strategies.

Precise data on the material make up of wind turbines and their components are often commercially guarded due to sensitivities. However, with suitable anonymity and industry expertise, this project will develop a Component Knowledge database that will capture the key components of the industry and their materials makeup. Subsequently, a materials route map will be developed to identify the possible end of life pathways currently available for the industry materials.

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Sustainable Decommissioning: Wind Turbine Blade Recycling – Phase 1

The report sets out the huge opportunity for the UK supply chain in designing solutions to tackle the recycling challenge and capturing a global market that encompasses 2.5 million tonnes of composites already in use in the wind energy sector. Many of the recycling technologies discussed in the report require further study but show promise in terms of the quality of recovered materials.

Recycling is just the start. Moving turbines towards zero waste will be the next opportunity for the UK supply chain through remanufacturing, reuse, repowering and upgrading of components too. If realised, a spin-off circular economy from offshore wind could extend the current projection of 60,000 jobs in the sector by an additional 20,000 jobs.

View report

Related Case Studies

Gen 2 Carbon – Accelerating the shift to a Circular Economy

GreenSpur

CEWS PROJECTS & OUTPUTS

THE RESCUE PROJECT

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 set up in early 2024 to establish a comprehensive and robust end-of-life materials network for the wind sector.

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MATERIAL PASSPORT

Already used in some other sectors for collecting and transferring information related to sustainability, circularity and value retention along the entire product lifecycle. As products move from supply chain to consumers to end of life, material passports can be continually updated with details such as raw material use, manufacturing processes and product repair records.

View a passport example

DECOMMISSIONING CASE STUDY: CEWS MATERIALS MAPPING

CEWS is building the body of knowledge required to establish standard practice and guidance for decommissioning offshore wind farms so that the sector may avoid the expensive and lengthy trial-and-error processes experienced by other sectors. This Decommissioning Case Study produced for Phase 1 of CEWS examines the readiness of the materials reprocessing industry to handle the quantity and types of materials arising from decommissioning of a generic geared and direct drive turbine.

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ECONOMIC VALUE CHAIN SUMMARY REPORT

This report summarises an investigation into the economic and environmental opportunities for more sustainable offshore wind decommissioning, with a view to identifying potential value chains. Key considerations include the supply chain readiness to handle the components and materials arising from the decommissioning in the most environmentally sustainable manner.

View Report

CONTACT OUR TEAM

The CEWS JIP is open to new members joining and we are keen to hear from supply chain companies wanting to support the development of a circular economy for the wind sector.