February 8, 2021
Toxic scrap: Wind and solarâs not-so-green flipside
Photovoltaic panels and wind turbines are green technologies â but not in terms of waste disposal. Both are difficult to break down in an environmentally sound way, leaving business and technical specialists demanding a solution.
WIND turbines â and their cousins, solar panels â maybe green energy creators but both wind turbines and photovoltaic modules are tough to break down, and nor can they readily be recycled.
Disposal options are too expensive and require far more resources than can be gained by either reuse or sustainable scrapping â at least with current technology.
That leaves the question of what is then to be done with the tens of thousands of wind turbines and solar panels that have served their full lifecycle and must be replaced, and which will only grow in number as the world moves away from fossil fuels.