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Solar industry versus recycling
The cheaper and lower cost of solar energy installations in recent years has made renewable energy more accessible than ever, leading to an exponential increase in its use from an industrial perspective not only, but also in homes to world level.
So, start thinking about him recycling solar panels It is important for all PV systems to provide renewable energy solutions and not represent a waste load for future generations. Because… What do we do with used solar panels?
Solar energy is having its absolute peak. Since the early 2000s, the number of solar panels installed around the world has grown exponentially, and is expected to continue to do so for decades.
By the end of 2022, an estimated 744.6 Gigawatts of solar energy had been installed worldwide (Benchmark report published in 2022 HERE)
According to a recent report by the International Renewable Energy Agency, that figure could reach 4,500 GW by 2050.
But the solar panels that generate that energy will not last forever. Industry standard lifespan is about 25-30 years, which means that some of the panels installed in those early days, are soon removed (See report HERE on estimation of useful life of solar panels).
And with each passing year, more and more will be removed from service, metal and glass photovoltaic modules that will soon start to add up to millions, and then tens of millions of metric tons of material.
The useful life of a solar panel is between 25 to 30 years
We are facing an issue of vital importance for a successful growth of environmental sustainability and for this, recently the WEEE directive (waste electrical and electronic equipment) has been updated by the EU to make the life cycle of the solar panels.
But… What numbers are we talking about when we intend to recycle photovoltaic installations around the world?
From a report issued by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA, for its acronym in English) they already give us some pints of the great work that recycling thousands and thousands of solar panels will entail.
Countries with more ambitious targets on renewable energy are expected to provide more waste globally. And the approximate calculation for 2050 on the volumes of waste accumulated in photovoltaic panels It is:
So for him By 2050 we will have approximately 60 - 78 million tons of waste in photovoltaic panels around the world. It is not a joke!
Nowadays, only the European Union has adopted specific regulations in the field of recycling. Most countries around the world classify them as garbage or industrial material.
In exceptional cases, such as Japan or the United States have general rules that affect the panels for the content of hazardous material, and the processes of treatment or destruction of the same, but through very poor and general legislation.
What's more, when talking about the guarantee of use and the parts of a photovoltaic solar panel, nothing is mentioned about the recycling of solar panels.
In the following graph we have the evolution to 2030 of the materials used by different panel technologies as the percentage of the total mass of the panel:
From a point of view of value in relation to the materials used, although thanks to technical advances and new technologies the use of silver is being considerably reduced, silver is by far the most expensive component per unit mass in a panel, followed by copper, silicon, aluminum, glass, and polymers.
Until now, two different recycling methods are used, thermal and mechanical, to ensure the correct procedure in recovering and putting back into the production cycle all the materials that solar panels are made of. The application of the first or the second depends on the presence of silicon in the solar panel modules.
the problem is no longer the intention to recycle, but rather that solar panels are complicated to recycle.
In addition, they are made of many materials, some dangerous, and assembled with adhesives and sealants that make them difficult to separate, and in many cases, without clear instructions for their recycling process.
We can also see the recycling process in a pilot plant of the Japanese NEDO program:
It is estimated that up to 90% of glass and semiconductor material can be reused in new panels or other glass products, but we have to think that almost 75% of the material that is separated is glass, which is easy to recycle into new products. But it also has a very low resale value, so the less value a 'recycler' can extract, the lower the incentive to recycle.
According to the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) … "The solar industry is creating programs to train commercial recycling companies to understand what is in manufacturers' products and how to break them down, but there is undoubtedly a long way to go."
Although there is still a long way to go from a legislative perspectiveThe long-term objectives of companies will be to ensure that the processes are cheap and efficient enough to cope with the wave of dismantled panels that we are going to find around the world. Actually, the total cost has to be so low that no one has to think of any option other than recycling.
And remember that we have an interesting article about what happens if you live in a city that only uses renewable energy …
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