Construction site of the week – Blasting of wind turbine

Blasting of wind turbine in Rhede

The six turbines in the Rhede wind farm (district of Emsland) are getting old and have therefore been put out of operation. They are now being removed piece by piece. A classic re-powering project: the old wind turbines will be replaced by newer, higher and more powerful wind turbines.

REISCH Sprengtechnik GmbH was awarded the contract for the dismantling, i.e. the blasting including dismantling work up to the recycling. Each demolition is individual and therefore requires extensive preparations.

Blast folding as a space-saving process

This turbine was an E66 wind turbine with a height of 98 meters. A total of 5 kg of explosives in 60 boreholes were required to bring down the 880-ton tower. When carrying out blasting operations, the company opted exclusively for the blast-folding method. Blast folding requires less space than conventional directional blasting.

After blasting is before shredding

The tower, which reminds on a white stick candle without the rotor blades, was blown up as planned and fell 40 meters in the main direction of fall and 50 meters in the direction of fall (measured from the edge of the foundation in each case). After the blasting is before the crushing: this was carried out immediately after the fall. Now there is room for new technology!

You can find a video of the demolition on our Facebook and Instagram channel.

Photos: REISCH Sprengtechnik GmbH