Essay by Eric Worrall
Following discovery of asbestos lift brake pads in Chinese manufactured Aussie turbines, turbine operators are conducting a frantic audit.
Asbestos turbine threat spreads, as Tim Wilson calls for renewables supply chain investigation
More Australian windfarms have been placed under internal investigations for asbestos exposure, as a shadow minister calls for a probe into the nation’s renewables supply chain.
Max Aldred and Conor Breslin
November 25, 2025 – 3:55PM...
On Friday, operator Goldwind discovered asbestos in lift brake pads at its Cattle Hill wind farm in Tasmania.
The Clean Energy Regulator, SafeWork New South Wales, and WorkSafe Victoria all launched investigations into the discovery.
The investigations prompted other wind farm operators to check their brake pads.
Over the weekend, Goldwind revealed they tested the parts – supplied by Chinese manufacturer 3S Industries – and found they did contain asbestos.
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Danish-owned Vestas, which operates more than one dozen projects across Australia, is also investigating any potential risks of asbestos exposure after ordering brake parts which may contain asbestos.
Read more: https://www.skynews.com.au/business/energy/asbestos-turbine-threat-spreads-as-tim-wilson-calls-for-renewables-supply-chain-investigation/news-story/d8d75319cb066c757bdf98762a7e44f3
According to their website 3S Industry specialises in industrial elevator and safety equipment, the kind of elevator platforms which carry technicians who want to service equipment on top of the turbine. But 3S Industry doesn’t just supply wind turbines, their products are also widely used in the construction industry. It seems unlikely asbestos brake pads were only used in wind turbines, so there could be asbestos contamination in office buildings, food sourced from farms adjacent to wind turbines which use 3S equipment, playgrounds and schools – anywhere 3S industry elevator or lifting equipment has been used.
I also doubt the scandal is limited to Australia. How much Asbestos is being used in British and US wind turbines lifts?
Is the scandal just confined to the lifts? Wind turbines also contain large friction clutches, which used to contain Asbestos until Asbestos was banned. Can we be sure there is no Asbestos inside Chinese turbine friction clutches, without dismantling them for inspection?
Asbestos is a long term cancer risk, the fibers have been linked to Mesothelioma, a nasty form of cancer which mostly affects the lungs and stomach. The microscopic fibers get stuck in vulnerable tissues, where they cause long term irritation leading to cancer. While the risk rises with amount of exposure, it only takes one microscopic fiber stuck in the wrong place to potentially kill you.
uhm, the dose makes the poison
Sample the wind, the air, the dirt then get back to us
Agree. I should have been dead years ago. Our old coal fired boiler where I grew up in New Jersey was covered with about 3 inches of troweled asbestos. When I caulked my cast iron pipes in my new house 60 years ago I used asbestos rope to clamp off the lead and asbestos gloves to protect my hands. I believe dose is everything. 94 this year.
I read an amazing story about Tsutomu Yamaguchi, who was evacuated to central Nagasaki after surviving the Hiroshima atomic bomb. He lived a long life, and died at age 93, despite absorbing an insane amount of radiation in a short period. Nevertheless I don’t recommend repeating his experience.
Most of us have been exposed to asbestos as kids. There was a recent scandal in Australia where imported school sand pit sand contained asbestos, which is likely far more of a risk. Nevertheless the last thing we need is these filthy wind turbines made with substandard materials spreading their poison across our farmland.
Some people smoke tobacco for 90 years and never get cancer, emphysema or other problems. I knew a man who was a retired US Navy radioman. He died of mesothelioma. Probably inhaled asbestos crawling around inside Navy ships while installing and maintaining radio equipment, made it to age 87. IIRC he was diagnosed about a year before he died.
That is how my Dad died, as an officer in the Canadian Navy. He knew of his condition a few years before passing, at the age of 84.
You’re my hero.
But, but, but . . .
Next thing you’ll be saying that the CO2 you breathe out hasn’t killed you yet! [pathetic attempt at humour. Sorry.]
Agreed.
In my teens we did house renovations with fibro, cutting asbestos sheet with electric saws and belt sanders. Now in my mid-80s with no history of BigC.
It is all too easy, in the present era of God-like treatment of “Conservation of the Environment” to over-state the harm from any number of substances. The danger is failure to recognise real cases of harm because Wolf was cried too many times.
Geoff S
Linear no threshold is now (wrongly) applied universally in the USA and other countries.
I actually disagree.
The dose typically does make the poison, but with mesothelioma from asbestos it is possible to get a fatal case from just a single fiber. That is probably even more likely for younger Americans – since in the U.S. non-smokers typically receive zero screening for lung cancer until they are quite old.
Further, asbestos is a bit of a catch-all term since there are six different (related) minerals in that group.
I believe all of them may cause cancer, but some are worse than others. Fortunately, the most commonly used type (chrysotile) is not the most carcinogenic. I suspect there are lots of people in the U.S. and around the world that have been exposed to asbestos that did not develop cancer.
However, that still does not mean it is safe to breathe in, even in micro-dosage amounts.
Also, of course, there are different types of asbestos – with very different threat levels!
Having had the misfortune to sell and repair Chinese-made goods, I realised that the Chinese have scant regard for health and safety…they much prefer the little red book, long after the Cultural Revolution…
Some years ago here in the US there was a recall of some children’s toys made in China.
Why? They were painted using lead paint.
While some may have the bejesus scared out of them by this news I think the asbestos issue is overblown.
“…it only takes one microscopic fiber stuck in the wrong place to potentially kill you.”
The issue here is that if US manufacturers can’t use asbestos then why is China allowed to. I don’t trust the government of China at all. Considering that wind doesn’t work why are we still buying wind products from China? It is just stupid.
Not entirely true. The use of chrysotile asbestos is still permitted for some purposes, and products containing less than 1% can be marketed as “asbestos free”. In general though, “asbestos” is “banned” unless you are successful in lobbying politicians to allow you to keep using it on economic (profit) grounds.
and a lot of Americans don’t trust the government of the US at all. Not to mention a lot of Chinese don’t trust the current administration, either. Maybe the Chinese and American people aren’t so different after all.
Which sort of asbestos?
3 main types, I can’t remember which are the really dangerous ones.
If I remember correctly, there is a long fibered type that comes from one mine in South Africa that is the really bad one.
In my opinion, not a big deal. To cause mesothelioma, asbestos must be inhaled. The chances of that happening around wind turbine brake pads when they are in use are slim to none.
OTOH, asbestos in brake pads was phased out in the 1980’s in the US. Shows in some ways how ‘backward’ and ‘cheap’ some Chinese manufacturing continues to be. Decoupling as many merits, quality being but one.
Except for the guys changing the pads they end up with it all over there hands and breathing the dust in. What is interesting is none of the press are interested in how the detection came about they are much more interested in the beat up.
That was me. Even slicing up fibro sheets with a grinder – mouth and nose clogged with dust. Just like everyone else at the time.
Still alive – go figure.
When I was in the army we used to blow the dust from the pads,55 years ago. No BIG C yet.
Yeah. Paul Newman died from ling cancer, It is assumed his time around race cars was the source. As well as smoking
Here is a California number for you:5%. That is the law in California for the maximum amount of asbestos fibers in serpentine gravel used on unpaved roads in California which require a permit (any public roadway). There are miles of unpaved serpentine gravel roads in places such as Copporopolis in the Sierra foothills. Would guess mechanical abrasion of these gravels tends to free up asbestos fibers more than serpentine dust, plus it is lighter and more easily disbursed, so road dust levels almost certainly exceed 5% serpentine. Oz is loaded w/serpentine and surely there are thousands of kilometers of unpaved roads using the stuff as roadbed. So whatever asbestos the wind choppers emit is likely dwarfed by thge dust kicked up by the service trucks.
had just read that Australia has a zero limit since 2003 for asbestos in serpentine used on roadbeds.
How many hospital cases are reported each year from serpentinite and how many death certificates are signed?
Consider the Big Daddy of environmental toxins, lead, Pb. All top authorities say there is no safe dose of Pb. Yet few people are diagnosed and hospitalised in Australia or US because of Pb poisoning. Figures are hard to find, but in USA, about 15 death certificates a year have had Pb as the cause of death. Many of these cases came from drinking moonshine made in still with pipe joints soldered together with Pb. Big deal?
A colleague was seriously injured by water in his house after a fly-by-night plumber used lead solder in a major renovation project. He has permanent dysautonomia (look it up).
Asbestos is indeed a dangerous particle. And it does cause mesothelioma. Microscopically it looks like a tiny golden wood screw. (I’m a pathologist by training). Steve McQueen died of this disease; I understand he worked on a ship before he became an actor and inhaled the particles there as he worked.
Removal of ceilings and other structures containing asbestos was and is a bad move as the particles were bound and the process of removal was and is hazardous.
Actually there are a lot of particles in the air with certain occupations that can cause serious health problems an example being sugar cane particles (dust) causing a serious disease call bagaossis.
As a newly graduated geologist I lived and worked at an asbestos mine (Cassiar) for several years in the early 1970’s. I later taught mineralogy and crystallography labs while a grad student at UBC; I have some insight into asbestos, particularly the chrysotile variety.
Chrysotile is a polymorph of serpentine, a hydrous iron-aluminum silicate. Serpentine has been carved producing dust for thousands of years and has never been considered carcinogenic, so how/why is chrysotile?
Notice that you will not find how a mineral like chrysotile directly causes mesothelioma; including in the above article the closest you get is that it is ‘linked to’ a disease. The pathology of exactly how a ferrous aluminosilicate causes cancer is not known, and is a close analogy to how CO2 causes uncontrollable atmospheric warming. There are many questions open to debate.
My (exploration) office in Cassiar was right beside the dryer exhaust in the ore path leading to dry rock storage; that exhaust pumped out 6 tons of asbestos dust per hour every hour I was there into the town atmosphere. At 77 I’m not dead nor have I ever had any signs of asbestosis or cancer of any kind.
It is my suspicion that the fibrules of a small size fraction—between about 2 and 10 microns—impale themselves on alveolar walls, where they become an irritant as they vibrate with air movement. To eliminate this irritation the human lung coats them in protein. In 15+ years the protein and fibrule break down, probably leaving a wound through which a cancer-enabling pathogen invades or metabolic disorder develops.
But the asbestos itself likely is no more the cause of an invasion than a knife is; the knife may open the wound, but it is another agent that infects. It is unlikely that you’ll come down with mesothelioma from walking past a braking windmill.
Beyond that, the allowance of asbestos brake pads because windmills are considered green-industry darlings is analogous to how the blades are allowed to maim and kill protected raptors. I have noted how the asbestos dust released across Manhattan when the twin towers collapsed was given the Obewan Jedi Mind Trick by the EPA as ‘this isn’t the asbestos dust you’re worried about, this asbestos dust can go on its way’ just like chopped up raptors from windmills or smoke-trailing birds at Ivanpah were given a pass.
These attitudes are incoherent.
The human body is a wonderful and mysterious thing. Just one haemorrhagic fever virus is sufficient to kill you. Nobody really knows why some people don’t get infected with say , Ebola, after massive exposure, or indeed why some individuals survive after becoming infected.
Maybe just one tiny particle of asbestos is enough to shuffle you off this mortal coil. Not everybody who smokes dies of lung cancer, while some who don’t smoke do.
Definitely mysterious.
Good post. Asbestos isn’t chemically involved in cancer, it is the nature of the inhaled dust mechanically that causes the issue.
It damages the deep parts of the lungs., irreparably. Just as smoke inhalation does. I suspect that it is the shape of the particles that renders them dangerous. Normally mucus is coughed out and clears the lungs. Smoking destroys cilia, inhibiting the ability to wash the lungs clean. Sharp edged dust embeds and stays.
Ther is a similar issue with Radon gas. It is associated with lung cancer, but especially in smokers. Once again radon rapidly decays to lead, and if you cant cough out the lead it des bad damage. The radiation itself may well not be the issue.
WOW! What’s next? . . . parts of trashed Chinese EV’s ending up in wind turbine blades exported to the US and Europe?
But wouldn’t that be entirely consistent with recycling to make “green energy” that much more “environmentally friendly”?
The Greens and Teals wont care. After all the wind turbines are nowhere near them!
Anything that stymies the proliferation of these inefficient and ugly turbines is OK with me.
I had a look at this after some brief exposure many years ago and was told that the risk depends on the type of asbestos and duration of exposure — I’m still here 😊.
Blue asbestos (crocidolite) is by far the most dangerous form and even brief exposure particularly in a confined space almost certainly will result in long-term lung cancer.
White or grey asbestos (Chrysotile) requires repeated and relatively longer exposure to have the same effect.
Chris, in a recent video about this MGUY stated that it was white asbestos in the Chinese windmills. If so, then the danger is very low.
Many people probably have fond memories of Christopher Booker, who sadly died some years ago. Writing in the UK Sunday Telegraph he was a constant campaigner against the climate madness. He also campaigned on the asbestos issue. He stated that while blue asbestos was dangerous, white asbestos was completely safe (similar to baby powder). He exposed many scams in which companies paid large sums of money to have completely safe white asbestos removed.
Like many here, I’m strongly opposed to these useless windmills destroying our countryside (and birds) but, if MGUY is right, this issue of asbestos in Chinese windmills is – shall we say – somewhat overblown.
Chris
Baby powder is not deemed to be safe. Johnson and Johnson has paid out millions if not billions to women who contracted gynecological cancers due to exposure to baby powder.
The fact that they paid out is not proof that baby powder had any role in cancers.
I believe that a court found them liable based on a preponderance of the evidence. They didn’t just settle the initial claims. Maybe they did with later ones.
Another GREEN job – brake pad replacer, journeyman apprentice.
Steve McQueen the actor only lived to be 50, inhaled asbestos in the navy.
It sure doesn’t take much to fool most of the people most of the time. 😮
Try to name something that isn’t – according to an “expert” somewhere?
But seriously, say 2 billion cars have been made, with asbestos brake pads which are ground away into microparticles, eventually needing to be replaced with more asbestos. Not to mention the asbestos used in various gaskets, or wrapped around various pipes as insulation. Oh, and clutch plates – nearly forgot. How much asbestos has been intentionally ground to powder, and released into the atmosphere?
Add to that the vast amounts of Fibro (fibrous asbestos cement) used for building and roofing, and it’s a wonder anybody survived to be poisoned by tetraethyl lead, carbon tetrachloride dry cleaning fluid, Deildrin or Heptachlor insecticides, or, as it turns out, vitamin B6.
Life is fraught with danger. At least many fire extinguishers use CO2, which must be perfectly harmless. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be used, would it?
“The cancer my friends, is blowing in the wind. The cancer is blowing in the wind.”
Mesothelioma is primarily causes by straight fiber amphibole asbestos such as amosite and chrocidolite and a few other straight fiber minerals. Brakes were once made from curly fiber chrysotile asbestos from the serpentine family of minerals which is unlikely to cause meso. Chrysotile will cause asbestosis, an embrittlement of lung tissue if exposed at high levels such as with insulators. Straight fiber minerals don’t work for brakes – to abrasive.
Has anyone checked cars, trucks, buses and aftermarket parts imported from China (and from India and other Asian countries)?
Shades of hydrogen sulfide in Chinese-manufactured drywall, melamine in Chinese-manufactured baby formula, and diethylene glycol in Chinese-manufactured toothpaste.
We can’t say we weren’t warned…
https://youtu.be/4p8Aq5BM9io?si=Z2VzME9vA_YbG5D0
Did they really expect quality from China?
The Chinese will supply whatever YOU are willing to pay for.
But most people buy on price, NOT quality.
Quality, Low Price, Speed of delivery … pick any two !!!
I just want to point out chrysotile asbestos doesn’t cause cancer though. Do they identify what kind of asbestos is used?
Buy Chinese, get disease.
So, the same amount as vehicle brakes. Got it.
“While the risk rises with amount of exposure, it only takes one microscopic fiber stuck in the wrong place to potentially kill you.”
I am not certain the alarmist phraseology is necessary.
Perhaps this is sufficient:
The cancer risk rises with the amount of exposure.
Unfortunately, the principle behind this amounts to «Ha! What’s good for a goose is good for a gander!» Which is demonstrably BS. Some beasts (and birds) being “more equal” than the rest is, um, the whole point.
Just to keep it close to ManBearPig, see an example in farmers vs. Monsanto rotten vegetable flinging. Did digging in the direction of «making it harder for farmers to adapt to climate change» accomplish anything? Could it accomplish anything when the target is Pestilence, Inc. itself? No and no.