Inspirations for Thriving Future(s) - 1 : Sustainable Purpose-Driven Business
One small idea that has a potential to reinvent the energy sector!
How did it all start?
In 2020 my friend Angelika Grundmann and I designed a learning for impact program. We called it: leadership for thriving future(s), and we had one purpose in mind: Providing aspiring purpose-oriented explorers with a learning experience for connecting:
1. personal wellbeing
2. participatory leadership and
3. entrepreneurship with planet regeneration in mind.
To us, this formula of the above three together is what we call: Thriving.
“When a person thrives, they feel a connection with life in a way that leads both to physical, social, and spiritual rewards. When an organization thrives, it provides a playground for a thriving world besides its financial prosperity rather than sabotaging everything in its way for profit”.
But we needed inspiring lighthouse examples beyond the consumer level, and it wasn’t easy to find large-scale purposeful projects.
I started asking everyone and everywhere. Until one great business mentor told m: Aman, I think you need to talk to Ron. His work might be of interest to you! In the following story, you too will get to know Ron, and you might just as I did smile, tear, and get charged with loads of hope.
The story
Ron is a wonderful grandfather who spent his entire career in the IT sector before retirement a few years ago. But it wasn’t until his granddaughter’s speech on climate change at her elementary school that he got moved. A decision was made to get out of his comfortable chair and to build something amazing while chanting with Micheal Jackson:
I’m gonna make a change
For once in my life
It’s gonna feel real good
Gonna make a difference
Gonna make it right!
The problem worth solving
Ron’s focus is on the renewable energy sector, windmills specifically. One challenge that is still persistent in the field is the poorly recyclable composite material the windmill blades are made of.
One Wind Turbine Takes 900 Tons of Steel, 2500 Tons Of Concrete, 45 Tons of Plastic, according to one expert in Manhattan Institute for Renewable energy!
Also, according to a study by Windesheim University of Applied Sciences, this means a total of 1300 tonnes of discarded windmill blades in 2025 will be involved. This number is expected to double in 2040. Ron and a small team of innovators have developed and patented a fully recyclable replacement for that waste!
What is so inspiring about Ron’s idea?
Ron started with a dream to make the world a better place for his grandchildren to live in. He talked to a couple of friends who jumped in with him. Then they talked to professors in chemistry, energy, and experts in other fields and collectively formed a team to experiment with a recycable heavily durable material in their garage! They involved students and universities along the line with them, the snowball got bigger. Currently, they are contacting big energy providers in Europe to showcase their progress and collaborate on growing the project even further to realizing it.
What’s more fascinating is that the team got excited about the potential of their robust material. They are now researching the inventory waste streams not only from windmill blades, but also potentially from boats, cars, planes, and trains. All of which are in phase 1 of the project. They think if we can replace windmill waste, why not other similar huge manufacturing waste too?!
Some challenges along the journey
They are all fully working out of passion with zero rewards or payment from any entity. For this phase, Ron and his team are looking for a subsidy amount of approximately Euro 200,000.
The current price paid to dispose of non-recyclable windmill blades is between 250€ and 400€ per 1000 kg. These blades are then dumped somewhere in a less advantaged land in anticipation of a solution for sustainable processing, which has a huge polluting footprint on our planet!
In comparison, the estimated price of the new almost fully-recyclable material is calculated to be 1.0€ to 2.5€ per 1000 kg, This price is of course still strongly influenced by the prices on the purchasing side and the surcharges for processing in the chain. Changing this is also part of the research in phase 1.
More about the details of the patent
Fiber Reinforced Thermoset Material (FRTM) is released from products and production, and it is usually dumped. The annual amount that is currently released in the Netherlands and the EU increases exponentially every year. Think of windmill blades, interiors of trains, cars, and aircraft waste from industrial production, etc. The energy transition is a major driver of the use of Thermoset materials.
In a process to be developed hopefully, the material is processed into high-quality constructive products. Many products are used in road, water, housing, and rail construction with high CO2 emissions during production or composed of scarce raw materials.
If that material could be replaced with constructive material, that seems to be suitable for saving on CO2 emissions and decreasing the use of FRTM to reach scarce levels.
The patented method of mixing recyclate and binders is uniquely aiming to do that. Therefore it opens up possibilities for developing a potential solution for most currently used industrial and large-scale FRTS materials that become available from production or end of life.
There aren’t yet any known alternatives in which are comparable in their impact of which large-scale heavy construction products can be made with the FRTS material with the addition of small amounts of binders. This is unique and has great potential!
By now converting the lead in the processing of FRTS EOL material into the production of high-quality constructive products, the new material can be used to create a foundation for the application and acceptance of these materials in the selected sectors. This will develop a market such that large parts of the FRTS-EOL material flow in the Netherlands (and the entire world) can be sustainably reused.
What’s next?
The team members are now discussing an innovative name of the new material, organizing themselves into a registered entity, and looking for interested people to join and contribute. It’s not so easy, however, the chances of success are estimatedly high and the shared purpose is emitting joy not only for the team, but for all of us. It will bring so much hope to see this team -and similar others working on large-scale impact- contributing to a better future for our grandchildren to live on a thriving planet.
