Monday, 03 June 2024 13:28

ENABLING circular composites starts with waste codes

Last week, seven industry associations working on increasing the circularity of composite materials have published a statement highlighting their valuable resource even at their end-of-life.

Our industries believe there is potential to develop a business case for sustainable end-of-life solutions for composites, starting with the wind energy and boating sectors.

They are the obvious candidates to start building up a regulatory framework enabling sustainable end-of-life solutions for composite materials. But the current EU regulatory frameworks on waste are not sufficient to enable the deployment and commercialisation of the sustainable waste treatment solutions for end-of-life composite materials.

Our associations are looking forward to engaging with the legislator to define the right regulatory framework, starting with the introduction of waste codes for end-of-life composite materials.

We call on the EU institutions to amend Europe’s waste policy in six ways so that we can achieve greater circularity in composite materials from decommissioned wind turbine blades and nacelles, and decommissioned boats :

  1. Revise the List of Waste to create dedicated waste codes for end-of-life composite materials from decommissioned wind turbine rotor blades and nacelles, and boats (see Annex I).
  2. Revise the Waste Framework Directive to set progressive targets for the reuse and recycling of composite material waste from decommissioned wind turbine rotor blades and nacelles, and boats covered by the waste codes in Annex I.
  3. Revise the landfill directive to set a landfill ban on the waste from decommissioned wind turbine rotor blades and nacelles, and boats covered by the waste codes in Annex I.
  4. Revise the waste shipment regulation to create dedicated codes for end-of-life composite materials from decommissioned rotor blades and nacelles, and boats to allow better intra-European transport. And to ensure composite material waste are subject to the Green control procedure of the Basel Convention.
  5. Recognise cement co-processing as a recycling process according to the Waste Framework Directive 2008/98/EC for its raw material recyclability.
  6. Enable on-site dismantling of recreational boats by simplifying permitting and licensing rules and procedures for occasional dismantling, including the potential use of mobile units (or inclusion in repair and maintenance licenses).

 Read the full position paper here.

Last modified on Tuesday, 04 June 2024 09:02