Just a minimal search on recycling PV panels produced this clip ,https://youtu.be/rlweV5SaIqU?si=bDicCD39BqFtmm6q. If you listen to the interviews you find everything is 'in the future', 'possible' , 'we need to see if this can be scaled up'. People are starting to ask questions but no-one is telling the whole storey because they don't have answers.
I am doing more research in Britain, France and Germany to see what is really happening currently but it is surprising (not) that there is very little information readily available.
Your article on floating solar panels refers:- Solar is touted as one of the success stories for for sustainable energy BUT more and more information is surfacing indicating that PV panels may NOT be the fix all. PV panels have a fairly short life span of 100% efficiency, they decline in output over time and must be replaced at 100% cost. Then, just like the wind turbine blades , PV panel constituents currently cannot be recovered. Currently the aluminium is recovered for feedstock but everything else gets crushed and ends up in landfill or as base materials for roads etc. Real world efforts have shown that if is not cost effective to even try to recover the 'valuable' stuff. In the future
there may be options but right now and for the foreseeable time the impact on the environment is not being fairly assessed. Thank you
Super interesting insights Dave. Thanks for sharing. If you have articles to share on this here, I'm sure our readers would love to learn more about all of this (as would we!).
Morning.
Just a minimal search on recycling PV panels produced this clip ,https://youtu.be/rlweV5SaIqU?si=bDicCD39BqFtmm6q. If you listen to the interviews you find everything is 'in the future', 'possible' , 'we need to see if this can be scaled up'. People are starting to ask questions but no-one is telling the whole storey because they don't have answers.
I am doing more research in Britain, France and Germany to see what is really happening currently but it is surprising (not) that there is very little information readily available.
Your article on floating solar panels refers:- Solar is touted as one of the success stories for for sustainable energy BUT more and more information is surfacing indicating that PV panels may NOT be the fix all. PV panels have a fairly short life span of 100% efficiency, they decline in output over time and must be replaced at 100% cost. Then, just like the wind turbine blades , PV panel constituents currently cannot be recovered. Currently the aluminium is recovered for feedstock but everything else gets crushed and ends up in landfill or as base materials for roads etc. Real world efforts have shown that if is not cost effective to even try to recover the 'valuable' stuff. In the future
there may be options but right now and for the foreseeable time the impact on the environment is not being fairly assessed. Thank you
Super interesting insights Dave. Thanks for sharing. If you have articles to share on this here, I'm sure our readers would love to learn more about all of this (as would we!).