Within the International Energy Agency (IEA) Wind Technology Collaboration Programme (TCP), a new Task is proposed under the heading CYCLEWIND: Harmonised Life Cycle Assessment for Wind Power. Currently, there is no Task within the IEA Wind TCP, that is focusing on the environmental sustainability assessment of wind power from a life cycle perspective. The proposed Task under the IEA Implementing Agreement for Co-operation in the Research, Development, and Deployment of Wind Energy Systems (IEA Wind) will therefore focus on the development of a harmonised Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach to wind power.

A variety of challenges regarding the environmental assessment of wind power has been identified by experts around the world. The primary challenges include on the one hand the lack of a consistent assessment approach and therefore a lack of comparability and transparency between LCA studies of wind power1–3. On the other hand, there is limited data availability while the existing life cycle inventory databases are rather outdated4. This Task will focus its efforts on these challenge areas, facilitate coordination and collectively work on the development of a harmonised approach for LCA of wind power.