Abstract
The ambitious targets for renewable energies in Germany indicate that the steady growth of installed capacity of the past years will continue for the coming decades. This development is connected with significant material flows—primary material demand as well as secondary material flows. These flows have been analyzed for Germany up to the year 2050 using a statistical model for the turbines’ discard patterns. The analysis encompasses the flows of bulk metals, plastics, and rare earths (required for permanent magnets in gearless converters). Different expansion scenarios for wind energy are considered as well as different turbine technologies, future development of hub height and rotor diameter, and an enhanced deployment of converters located offshore. In addition to the direct material use, the total material requirement has been calculated using the material input per service unit (MIPS) concept. The analysis shows that the demand for iron, steel, and aluminum will not exceed around 6% of the current domestic consumption. The situation for rare earths appears to be different with a maximum annual neodymium demand for wind energy converters corresponding to about a quarter of the overall 2010 consumption. It has been shown that by efficiently utilizing secondary material flows a net material demand reduction of up to two thirds by 2050 seems possible, (i.e., if secondary material flows are fully used to substitute primary material demand).
Highlights
Background and ObjectivesThe installed capacity of wind energy is growing rapidly
Under the assumption that the national demand for bulk metals will not change drastically from 2010 values, we conclude that wind energy deployment in Germany will not substantially contribute to material shortages for these metals
Even if the criticality of rare earths itself should decrease in the future, e.g., due to new mines coming into operation, the environmental implications will pose a reason for concern and should be addressed by the manufacturers of wind energy converters
Summary
The installed capacity of wind energy is growing rapidly. Over the past 15 years, wind energy has undergone a rapid expansion in Germany, the European Union (EU), and globally. The installed wind energy capacity increased from 6100 MW in 1996 to about 238,000 MW in 2011 [1]. In the EU, wind energy converters accounted for 21.4% (=9616 MW) of all newly installed capacity in. When looking at a 10 year period, the rapid expansion of wind energy becomes even more evident: while the share of wind energy in the EU’s capacity mix was about 2% in the year 2000 (=12,887 MW) it accounted for over 10% (=93,957 MW) in 2011 [2].
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