Addressing Heterogeneity in the Development of Circular Economy Strategies in the Offshore Wind Industry : A Review

To offset the impact of climate change, a transition to renewables in the energy sector is needed. Offshore wind energy (OWE) is a promising renewable technology that is developing at an unprecedented rate. However, the offshore wind (OW) industry is material intensive, and there are concerns about its end-of-life (EOL) strategies and that we might end up exchanging a climate challenge with a material challenge. The question is whether there are available, mature, and commercially viable solutions for OW companies that want to adopt CE. This study contributes by offering an exhaustive review of the academic literature on existing and emerging CE strategies for the OW industry and classifying them according to the TRL/strategy assessment framework. The systematic literature review identified 45 relevant articles using three databases and a keyword search. The main conclusion is that CE in the OW industry is an under-researched, underdeveloped field with great heterogeneity in the development of CE strategies. This heterogeneity is caused by wide variation in the country and region-specific development of CE strategies, policy and regulatory factors, the economic viability of CE strategies, and lack of knowledge. We also find that those strategies with potentially the best environmental outcome are the ones that are furthest from market maturity and commercial viability