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US company claims a 99 percent recovery rate with old solar panels
We Recycle Solar, a startup based in Arizona, shows how old and out-of-service solar panels could be used in the future. The startup works directly with businesses, helping them dispose of solar waste responsibly and make some money.
The world is currently focused on phasing away fossil fuels and ushering in a carbon-less way of generating energy. Much of this plan rests on solar panels, which can trap sun rays and convert them into electricity. The technology has been improving over the years but also presents a problem now that the first wave of solar installations has come to the end of its life cycle.
Solar panels are estimated to have a lifespan of 30 years, after which they can no longer generate power efficiently. In countries like the US, the user bears the cost of removing and recycling these panels, making it easier to dump them at a local landfill.
Recycling solar panels
Arizona-based We Recycle Solar aims to offer customers a better option than to dump the panels. It has partnered with various solar panel manufacturers, contractors, and utility companies to source older solar panels.
The startup gives a new lease of life to new solar panels that might have a production defect or be damaged during installation by refurbishing them. Such panels often find a market outside the US. But many more panels in the US are currently being phased out, which will only increase soon.
The startup gives owners of these panels an option to recycle the components by offering money as an added incentive.
'Urban Mining'
CEO Adam Saghei says that the startup has found treasure in the decrepit solar panels after its engineers perfected the process after more than three years of effort. Saghei calls the process "urban mining" and has used it to recover silver, copper, aluminum, glass, and silicone from these unwanted solar panels.
The cost of removing old solar panels is borne by the customer in the US
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On its website, the startup claims to have recovered 495 tons of aluminum, 147 tons of copper, and over 10,000 tons of glass. It is easy to gauge the interest in metals since they can be put back into manufacturing.
The organization's brilliance has been finding suitable uses for items like silicone and glass. "You can use it for sand traps on golf courses, you can refine it for sandblast mix, you can also use it for the stones or the glass mix that you get for outdoor fireplaces," Saghei told AFP.
At a facility in Yuma, Arizona, the startup is processing 7,500 panels a day while being able to recover 99 percent of materials and putting them back to kickstart a circular economy.
Few organizations are willing to take up this role right now, given the labor and energy-intensive nature of the business. However, Saghei is confident that as more panels begin to go out of service, the industry will scale, and many more companies will join the fray for urban mining.