Landfill Panic vs System Reality: What Wind & Solar Actually Displace - CleanTechnica

The article from CleanTechnica addresses recurring claims that wind turbines and solar panels contribute significantly to landfill waste, suggesting that these clean energy sources merely replace one environmental problem with another. While wind turbine blades and solar panels do generate physical waste at the end of their lifecycles, the article emphasizes the importance of evaluating this waste in the context of the entire electricity system and on a per megawatt-hour (MWh) basis. When annualized over their operational lifetimes, wind turbine blades contribute approximately 0.1 to 0.25 kilograms of material waste per MWh, and solar panels produce similarly low amounts. These materials are inert and managed within engineered waste systems, contrasting sharply with fossil fuel waste. In comparison, coal and natural gas power generation produce continuous and substantial waste streams during operation, including roughly 900 to 1,000 kilograms of CO2 per MWh from coal, along with nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, particulates, and toxic fly ash. Natural gas emits