Repurposing wind turbine blades as furniture

9 August 2024

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It’s time for a renovation of the Elicio HQ in Ostend so what could be better than recycling wind turbines to furnish our office?

Up to 90% of a wind turbine is easily recyclable. The remainder of a wind turbine’s total mass mostly consists of the turbine blades. Because they are made of composite materials, they’re more difficult to deal with than concrete or steel. But many solutions already exist, and the wind industry is working hard to make them fully recyclable.

In the meantime, we’re prioritising the reuse of decommissioned blades by repairing and upgrading them to extend their lifetime or installing them on other wind turbines.  But there’s another option too! Repurposing them into something completely different – in this case, nice urban furniture to cheer up our office.

The furniture we have installed at our office is made of old wind turbine blades that have been cut, repaired and assembled together with other materials like wood. The company GP reblade works with artists, architects, designers and students to turn old blades into innovative, beautiful and practical pieces of urban furniture. The turbine blade composite materials are extremely resilient to weathering, making the benches and tables well-suited for outdoor use in our garden!