Solar power is part of the renewable energy revolution that aims to replace the energy produced by fossil fuels with clean power produced by solar panels, to reduce the air pollution that affects our civilization.
The problem with solar panels appears at the end of their life cycle when a large part of them are not disposed properly, so they end up in landfills where they start polluting the environment with all kinds of dangerous chemicals.
How Long Do Solar Panels Last?
Solar panels represent today a form of clean technology that can help us become energy independent, but they have a limited life expectancy of about 30 years, which means that after three decades of usage, their efficiency drops so much that we have to replace them.
According to SEIA.org, the U.S. installed in 2019 about 13.3 GW of solar energy, and the country is on the fourth place in terms of generation capacity for solar (41 GW) worldwide.
13.3 GW in solar generation capacity represents roughly 44.3 million solar panels (with an average capacity of 300 W), and this is an increase of 30% compared to 2018.
The number of new solar installations will continue to grow in the U.S. and worldwide, and this only means that in about three decades from now on, mankind will have to deal with a huge number of solar panels that have ended their life cycle.
We have to include here the large number of solar panels (hundreds of millions), that flooded the U.S. market starting with 2010, and have a shorter life expectancy, which means that they will become waste much sooner.
When mankind realized that solar energy could become a major source of clean electricity for our civilization, the main interest was to increase the production of solar panels to bring the costs down and make solar panels competitive against conventional sources of energy represented by fossil fuels and nuclear power.
Back then, nobody thought about the moment when these clean technologies will end their life cycle and will become solar panel waste that must be properly disposed to avoid a massive pollution of the environment with toxic chemicals.
How Are Solar Panels Recycled Today?
Solar panel recycling is treated in a different way in the United States, Europe and China.
Recycling Solar Panels in the United States
There are a few U.S. states that are trying to start the solar panel recycling movement in the country.
Washington was the first state that passed a solar stewardship bill (ESSB 5939), which required all solar manufacturers in the state to have a recycling program for all their solar products.
Manufacturers that will fail to provide a recycling program for their solar products won’t be able to sell solar panels in the state starting with January 1, 2021.
The state of New York has a similar bill (S2837B) at the New York State Senate, and the purpose of the bill is to establish a solar panel recycling infrastructure and protocols, which requires that all solar manufacturers in the state will have to collect and recycle, all solar panels ending their life cycle.
In 2015, California passed a bill (SB-489), which considers photovoltaic modules as hazardous waste, and encourages the safe disposal of solar panels that have become waste.
Sam Vanderhoof, owner of Solar CowboyZ (a consulting company providing solar PV and renewable energy consulting services), recently started a recycling program for solar panels in the U.S. called ‘Recycle PV’, and this program is similar to the ones used in Europe for solar panel recycling.
Vanderhoof says that the plan for Recycle PV is to get volumes of solar panel waste large enough to build a dedicated facility for solar panel recycling in the United States. He expects to see a volume of at least 10,000 solar modules per month that have to be recycled to build the facility.
Recycling Solar Panels in China
In 2015, China managed to overcome the U.S. and Germany in terms of installed solar capacity, and this way they’ve become the country with the largest number of solar panels installed.
In 2020, China is still the world leader with a cumulative installed solar PV capacity of 204.68 GW.
All these efforts to improve country’s capacity to produce solar energy will continue in the next decades because China aims to reach a solar PV capacity of 1,300 GW by 2050.
However, the huge number of solar panels installed after 2010, will become waste starting with 2030, and the volume of solar panels that are ending their life cycle will continue to grow year after year.
Today, China doesn’t seem to care about the moment in the future when today’s solar panels will become waste because the expenses related to the handling of solar panel disposal or recycling aren’t included into production costs.
In China, the solar waste that will peak in 2030, is compared with the peak of the electronic waste issue that occurred between 2010 and 2015.
China introduced rules on electronic waste, and this way, they avoided to become the dumping site for the world’s toxic waste represented by electronics scraps.
China considers that they can introduce similar rules 2030, when solar waste will become critical.
Recycling Solar Panels in Europe
Europe started to take care of the solar panel waste much sooner.
A directive enacted in 2012 (WEEE Directive), requires all solar producers to take responsibility for recycling all the solar panels that they’ve sold, and this way the problem with the hazardous waste produced by PV panels (e-waste is the name of the solar panel waste in the EU) is solved.
More than that, all solar cell manufacturers must accomplish certain legal requirements and recycling standards in order to be sure that their solar panels will not pollute the environment at the end of their life cycle.
The Recycling Process of Solar Panels
The answer to the question ‘Can solar panels be recycled?’ is definitely “Yes!”.
There are two types of solar PV (photovoltaic) modules used today by homeowners and companies: silicon based photovoltaic panels and thin-film based photovoltaic panels.
1. Recycling Silicon Based PV Panels
Silicon based PV panels contain: 1% metals, 5% silicon, 8% aluminium, 10% plastic and 76% glass.
The recycling process of silicon based PV panels includes the following steps:
- collecting waste solar panels;
- disassembling the aluminium and glass parts;
- thermal processing at 932°F (500°C), to recover 100% of the metal and about 95% of the glass;
- during the thermal processing, the covering plastic evaporates and the heat produced is reused as a heat source;
- cell modules are physically separated by etching away silicon wafers which recovers about 80% of the modules;
- the broken wafers are melted to recover about 85% of the silicon.
2. Recycling Thin-film Based PV Panels
Thin-film based PV panels contain: 1% metals, 6% aluminium, 4% plastic and 89% glass.
The recycling process of thin-film based PV panels includes the following steps:
- collecting the waste thin-film panels;
- shredding the panels into smaller pieces of 4 to 5 mm;
- using a rotating screw to separate solid and liquid;
- removing the thin-film using acid and peroxide
- precipitation and dewatering;
- separating and processing metals to recover about 95% of the semiconductor material;
- to recover the glass, vibration is used to remove interlayer materials;
- rinsing the glass, which will recover about 90% of the glass.
Solar Panel Recycling in the Future
In the United States and Europe we have laws that require solar panel manufacturers to deal with the solar waste created by their panels at the end of the life cycle, but in China the situation is different.
Solar waste will become an issue in 2030 when a pretty large number of solar modules will reach the end of their life cycle.
However, the problem created by solar waste will become critical only after 2040, when a huge number of solar panels will reach the end of their life cycle.
There is a huge untapped potential a huge untapped potential for the solar panel recycling industry today.
By 2024, the global solar panel recycling market can worth about $360 million, and is projected that by 2050, will worth about $16 billion.
Solar panel manufacturers that will start early to recycle solar panels will be able to reuse a good amount of materials recovered from solar waste, and this can bring down the costs of the new panels built from recycled materials even more.
Conclusion
If the industry will take care of the solar waste, we as current or future owners of solar PV systems, will have to properly dispose the panels at the end of their life cycle (not in the landfill), to avoid a massive pollution of the soil with toxic chemicals.
