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The incorporation of new technical challenges created by the increase of the wind power industry in the world and how they were integrated into a MSc Course of Mechanical Engineering is addressed in this article. A Design Thinking Process [1] approach based on student-centered pedagogy of Project-Based Learning [2] was developed for the 12 ECTS course on Product Development and Industrial Processing at the Bragança Polytechnic Institute, Portugal, held in the second semester of the 2015/2016 school year [3]. In this pedagogic experience, the students where challenged to create new and innovative proposals for the use of a new material: the shredded straw derived from wind turbine blades.

Large wind turbines are designed for a life span of 20 to 25 years. As being decommissioned after that period, the steel tower is recycled, the cooper cables, generators, electric, electronic and hydraulics equipment and other different materials that are part of the whole machine are also sent to recycling centres where the raw material is recuperated and introduced back again into the economy [4].