Multifunctional Nanocomposites for Offshore Wind Turbine Blades: Materials, Processing and Performance

Energy is an essential ingredient of socio-economic development and economic growth. Renewable energy sources like wind energy is indigenous and can help in reducing the dependency on fossil fuels. It has been estimated that roughly 10 million MW of energy are continuously available in the earth’s wind. Wind energy provides a variable and environmental friendly option and national energy security at a time when decreasing global reserves of fossil fuels threatens the long-term sustainability of global economy. Wind energy is the only power generation technology that can deliver the necessary cuts in CO₂ in the critical period up to 2020, when greenhouse cases must peak and begin to decline to avoid dangerous climate change. Over the past ten years, global wind power capacity has continued to grow at an average cumulative rate of over 30%, and 2008 was another record year with more than 27 GW of new installations, bringing the total up to over 120 GW.