Circular economy priorities for photovoltaics in the energy transition

Abstract

Among the many ambitious decarbonization goals globally, the US intends grid decarbonization by 2035, requiring 1 TW of installed photovoltaics (PV), up from ~110 GW in 2021. This unprecedented global scale-up will stress existing PV supply chains with increased material and energy demands. By 2050, 1.75 TW of PV in the US cumulatively demands 97 million metric tonnes of virgin material and creates 8 million metric tonnes of life cycle waste. This analysis leverages the PV in Circular Economy tool (PV ICE) to evaluate two circular economy approaches, lifetime extension and closed-loop recycling, on their ability to reduce virgin material demands and life cycle wastes while meeting capacity goals. Modules with 50-year lifetimes can reduce virgin material demand by 3% through reduced deployment. Modules with 15-year lifetimes require an additional 1.2 TW of replacement modules to maintain capacity, increasing virgin material demand and waste unless >90% of module mass is closed-loop recycled. Currently, no PV technology is more than 90% closed-loop recycled. Glass, the majority of mass in all PV technologies and an energy intensive component with a problematic supply chain, should be targeted for a circular redesign. Our work contributes data-backed insights prioritizing circular PV strategies for a sustainable energy transition.

El Estudio de Resiliencia de la Red Electrica de Puerto Rico y Transiciones a Energia 100% Renovable (PR100): Informe Final

“…64 Además, las baterías de vehículos eléctricos se pueden reacondicionar para almacenamiento estacionario reemplazando celdas o módulos dañados y reconfigurando los módulos o paquetes para adaptarse a una aplicación que no sea para vehículos (Chen et al 2019). Si bien se ha descubierto que el uso de módulos fotovoltaicos, cuya vida útil es mayor, es una forma más eficaz de reducir los residuos que el reciclaje (Mirletz et al 2022), considerando la vida útil de muchas tecnologías actuales, será importante para Puerto Rico desarrollar y expandir industrias para la reutilización, remanufactura y reciclaje de estos equipos.…”

Assessing the competitiveness of solar photovoltaic products in comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-pacific partnership countries

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Photovoltaics module reliability for the terawatt age

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