RECYCLING END OF LIFE BOATS

The marine industry is puzzling over how to dispose safely of redundant, environmentally toxic GRP-built craft. Ollie Taylor investigates

- OLLIE TAYLOR

The annual volume of composite waste generated by the marine industry each year is a staggering 55,000 tonnes – and it’s predicted to increase by 10% every year in the near future as more and more leisure yachts reach their end of life (EOL). Glass reinforced plastic (GRP), commonly known as fibreglass, is the wonder material that created the modern leisure marine industry back in the 1960s, transforming what was once an artisanal, predominantly wood-based industry, into the high volume mass production model now pumping out an estimated 10,000 new boats in the UK alone each year. However, GRP, and the successful lightweight, rigid structures it produces were never designed with an EOL solution in mind, leaving today’s boatbuilding industry scratching its head for a solution to what is becoming an increasingly urgent problem.

There are an estimated six million boats in the EU at the moment, 95% of which are made of GRP. Each year, 1-2% (60,000120,000) reach the end of their usable life.

The fate of these craft is relatively unknown but it’s estimated that only 2,000-3,000 are properly recycled each year. And, unfortunately, there are several fundamental challenges that currently restrict the marine industry and its ability to solve this problem. Composite structures, such as GRP, by their very nature are designed to last a long time, delivering very specific material properties. Stronger than many metals by weight, non-conductive, and with the ability to be moulded into highly complex shapes, GRP is the perfect material for making boats in high volumes and at low cost. However, the process of combining glass fibre with a thermoset resin to achieve the properties modern designs need results in a structure that was never meant to ever be separated again.