Scientific assessment in support of the materials roadmap enabling low carbon energy technologies : wind energy

The European Strategic Energy Technology Plan (SET-Plan), adopted by the European Union in 2008, is a first step to establish an energy technology policy for Europe. The SET-Plan will support the 2020 energy and climate change objectives through the establishment of the European Industrial Initiatives (EIIs) for low-carbon energy technologies. One of the SET-Plan initiatives to support the EIIs is to analyse the materials that will be needed in order to achieve the 2020 targets, in terms both of amounts and of technical specifications, and the way to get there. For this, the SET-Plan Materials initiative was created to foster a roadmap which is based on the corresponding scientific assessment. This assessment, whose wind energy aspects are presented in this report, includes the aspects of technology and system state-of-the-art and challenges; material supply status and challenges; ongoing research and actors, and challenges; materials specification targets for market implementation in 2020/2030 and in 2050; synergies with other technologies; and needs and recommendation of activities addressing 2020 and 2050 market implementation.