The SNP has rejected a European-style ban on “wind turbine graveyards”.
Austria, Finland, Germany and the Netherlands have already banned giant fibreglass and plastic blades from landfill sites.
A number of other countries are expected to follow suit amid concerns about what to do as the first generation of wind farms is decommissioned.
The Scottish government, which has been a major supporter of wind power, said it was looking at recycling and reuse options for the blades, some of which have a sweep as big as a football pitch.
A spokesman said: “While the Scottish government does not currently have any plans to impose a landfill ban on the disposal of wind turbines in Scotland we are working with industry to ensure that all options around reuse and recycling of materials are explored before any wind farm components are sent to landfill.
“This includes a commitment to position Scotland as a European hub for the reuse and refurbishment of turbine parts by improving the Scottish and UK-wide supply chains and the establishment of a specialist blade treatment in Scotland.”
In America blades have been sawn up and buried in graveyards in the plains states, with hundreds at a site in Wyoming. There are attempts to develop new recyclable technology and think of ways of re-using the existing structures.
Maurice Golden, a Scottish Conservative MSP who has significant professional expertise in recycling, claimed the “SNP’s lack of vision on tackling climate change is astonishing”.
He said: “Scotland should be leading the way in decommissioning wind turbines and a landfill ban on blades is one way to pump-prime the market. The SNP have presided over a litany of broken promises on climate change from thousands of jobs which have never materialised to their humiliating climbdown on ditching their own climate change targets.”
Pressure group Scotland Against Spin, which campaigns for the reform of the government’s wind energy policy, says the Scottish government has had 25 years to come up with a solution.
Aileen Jackson, a spokeswoman for the group, said: “It is hypocritical of the Scottish government not to ban blades from landfill when it is constantly boasting about being a world leading light on environmental issues.
“Disposing of blades in landfill would be contrary to everything the Scottish Government is seeking to achieve in its recently lodged Ecocide Bill, which aims to prevent and criminalise the most severe forms of environmental harm.
“The point, of course, is that the environmental impact of non-recyclable blades should have been dealt with long before it arrived at the stage where decommissioning is now taking place.” https://www.thetimes.com/uk/scotland/article/landfill-an-option-as-wind-turbines-go-out-of-commission-0tstd8g5z
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