'Fraud and deception' | GE sues over 'failure to recycle wind turbine blades'

In what it called “a case about fraud and deception”, US industrial giant GE has filed suit in New York federal court against a Texas-based outfit for breach of contract to recycle wind turbine blades.

In its complaint, GE said it contracted Global Fiberglass Solutions (GFS) to remove and recycle 5,000 blades from multiple customer wind farms in Iowa and Texas. The blades were mostly replaced with newer blades as part of repowering the onshore arrays.

However, GE later learned that “GFS merely stockpiled the blades it obtained from GE’s customer sites at various locations— as well as blades from other customers — where they simply sat for years without GFS taking any steps to recycle them,” according to its complaint.

The giant turbine OEM, which holds some 56% of the US onshore wind market share according to trade group American Clean Power Association, said it paid GFS nearly $17m for the service, “because GE believed it was hiring a premier, environmentally-conscious corporate citizen that ultimately would recycle the blades”.

The complaint stated that GFS "represented itself during negotiations as a reputable vendor in wind turbine blade recycling—all in order to induce GE to engage GFS for the recycling of the Blades from GE’s customer sites”.

GFS was founded in 2009 "to address the growing waste stream and lack of sustainable alternatives for non-degradable fiberglass", the company said on its website.

The company said its patented recycling processes for recycling fiberglass composites were developed with Washington State University.

The agreements were signed in 2017 and, according to GE, GFS for years maintained that it was recycling the blades that it removed.

However, in 2019 the turbine OEM received an inquiry from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources over whether GFS was improperly storing waste blades at sites in the state. Other inquiries followed in 2020, leading GE to file the lawsuit.

The suit seeks damages of $16.9m for the original contracts, plus another $5.5m for subsequent “alternative disposal” of the blades in question as well as legal fees.

Waste concerns

Waste from older renewable energy systems is a growing concern as the energy transition matures.

GFS had purportedly promised to shred the waste GE blades into pellets that could be used in other products and had even travelled to the OEM’s Schenectady, New York headquarters with examples and plans for a route to market for the recycled materials.