Only a small percentage of the disused solar collectors of Australia are recycled. This is not due to a lack of know-how, but a failure to act successive governments according to a joint explanation signed by dozens of groups.
Request state measures against SolarPV waste
Under the leadership of the Smart Energy Council, a coalition of dozens of industry, economic, trade union, communal and environmental groups and local governments calls on the Federal Government to found a mandatory product management scheme for solar modules during this parliamentary term. The Federal Government is also asked to implement a financed pilot program in the meantime that influences the program for the design of the program and attracts investments to ensure its success.
The joint explanation claims that it is a chance of 6.5 billion US dollars that could strengthen the critical security of mineral resources, spark innovation, the new local industry, production and jobs.
Progress (or missing) until today
Australia’s solar revolution was almost breathtaking. Millions of solar modules decorate roofs across the country, not to mention the millions that are installed on solar parks.
Good quality solar modules should take decades and they have been detected under real conditions. Unfortunately, not all solar collectors are of good quality, and the lifespan of many panels is ended prematurely by system upgrades.
In 2021, Sussan Ley, the then environmental celebration of the environment, noticed the solar industry that a cross-sector nationwide stewardship design design must be completed by June 2022. At that time, the Clean Energy Council (CEC) 1 had pushed back and worked back.
In the years since then there have been various suggestions and opinions that were expressed by government departments. This year, for example, the productivity commission signaled its support for the establishment of a KO regulatory product stewardship system for Solar PV.
Still no scheme.
“Time has expired and the Australian sector for renewable energies is ready to act,” says the explanation. “This is more of a resource solution than a waste problem.”
Which materials can be reclaimed from solar collectors?
Almost everything:
- Glass
- aluminum
- silicon
- copper
- Silver
- Connection/terminal boxing material
- Cable
- Even the ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) capsulans.
The aluminum frame and the glass alone represent a large proportion of the weight of a solar panel – about 85%. However, the restoration of all materials that can be reclaimed is still expensive and energy -intensive. So it is mainly the glass and aluminum that attracts attention.
A waste crisis’
While in Australia it is able to achieve a material recovery of 95%and several recycling/recovery systems have been determined, another problem is logistics. The costs for the transport of panels to a recycling system can be larger than that of sending them to a local landfill. And even this undesirable result is no longer an option in some jurisdiction due to e-waters.
Up to this point, the majority of the disused modules have gone to other countries after overseas, but the current super low prices for new solar collectors see that demand has been influenced.
According to the Smart Energy Council, installers and households are forced into stocks and illegal dumping incidents in regional and rural areas are increasing.
“There is an escalating crisis with Solar -PV panel waste with serious ecological and social effects,” says the explanation. “The decommissioning of panel twice as high that a recycling industry that has strongly invested in the promise of a national product management program will stagnate and go back with the associated jobs after a decade of politics.”
As early as 2019, the fact that Ronald Brakels, based in solar quotes, stated that it had no waste crisis on the horizon. Nevertheless, our habit of sweeping crap under the carpet (landfill) is the best way to deal with most forms of waste. And illegal dumping is hideous-not only in terms of ecological and aesthetic problems, but also the cleanup.
The focus should therefore be on making the recycling/material gain from solar panel as efficiently and inexpensive as possible. And in this sense, a container deposit scheme sounds?
Footnot
- Interestingly, the logo of the CEC is nowhere to be seen under the dozens of the joint explanation. ↩
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