What REALLY happens to used Solar Panels?

Video script and citations:

Get my achieve energy security with solar guide:

Follow-up podcast:

Join the Undecided Discord server:

👋 Support Undecided on Patreon!

⚙️ Gear & Products I Like

Visit my Energysage Portal (US):
Research solar panels and get quotes for free!

And find heat pump installers near you (US):

Or find community solar near you (US):

For a curated solar buying experience (Canada)
EnergyPal's free personalized quotes:

Tesla Referral Code:
Get 1,000 free supercharging miles
or a discount on Tesla Solar & Powerwalls

👉 Follow Me
Mastodon

X

Instagram

Facebook

Website

📺 YouTube Tools I Recommend
Audio file(s) provided by Epidemic Sound

TubeBuddy

VidIQ

I may earn a small commission for my endorsement or recommendation to products or services linked above, but I wouldn't put them here if I didn't like them. Your purchase helps support the channel and the videos I produce. Thank you.

[drdehailey]

Finding a way to recycle solar panels is critical in the future, but "reuse" comes before "recycle" in the circular economy. I bought used 66Wh panels in 1999 for an off-grid cabin. When I replaced them last summer, I gave them to a friend to run his water pump. A good, used panel industry would be a good thing, as well. Great presentation BTW.

[sterlingarcher]

Long term, I'd say the smart money is in designing a cheap to manufacture solar panel that's specifically recyclable. Have the disassembly process baked in to the architecture itself.

[Justintheinsane]

The only problem I had with solar panels was that we couldnt reuse them. Also recently Ive found websites that sells used panels that are within the 80% power gen mark. For 1/4 of the orginal price. They are sold as DIY/ home experiments. It was 65$ for a 200watt Panel, vs the 300$ for a new 200watt panel.

[jopo]

Recycling is probably the most needed and important technology of all. It shouldn't be a choice. Governments should be subsidizing it and it's great for job creation.

[BluBuryPi]

Excellent video Matt. So important for us to be able to reuse these precious materials instead of mining more. I love the idea of a cyclical production chain

[johnslugger]

*Here in Alaska we use old solar panels for building Water Proof Roofs and Siding for homes and barns. It's tougher than Plywood!*

[anandsharma]

There are logically a few options I can see in this whole lifecycle:
1. Make solar panels modular, using non-toxic glues and designs such that recycling them is easy. Recyclable by design.
2. Use more solar film based technology so that you reduce glass, aluminium, and glue.
3. As solar panel manufacture increases and inevitably improves iteratively, make them comply to certain minimum global recyclability standards. There will still be non-standard cheaper products manufactured, but if there is a standard, it is easier to mandate in law, reducing the spread of poor design.
4. If the output of solar panels only decreases with time, they can be used for longer periods in "used goods" markets where efficiency isn't important. In this way, the panel can have a second useful life before being recycled for low efficiency use cases.
#1 and #4 are mutually exclusive. I mean if you can recycle them well, then who will use them at low efficiency.

[greatpix]

Matt, I was thinking a yearly update video on the state of recycling in general would worthwhile. I just watched your video on recycling solar panels and another on recycling lithium batteries from 2 years ago which got me to thinking about changes in battery chemistry/design (again from your past videos), solar panel production and other things that end up in landfills but could be recycled, means changes in how recycling is done too.

[briannelson]

I work in Odessa and am excited to see this!

I have to correct you though, that's not an oil rig. It's an oil well and that is the pumping unit for the well, commonly called the pump jack

[gmazelli]

End of life recycling should be embedded in the panels from their construction, for example using glue that can be simply heated up or vaporized to separate the layers

[coffeeshangarworkshop]

The used solar panel market is probably the most efficient way to reduce waste. Millions of panels are being decommissioned simply because they have reduced efficiency since when they were new, but they are still putting out good voltage and amperage and are perfectly usable by off-grid homeowners. They are available on Facebook marketplace, craigslist, etc often for around 30 cents per watt... however making them less expensive would increase availability for them. I'd like to see the companies that install/remove solar panels include a strategy of getting them very cheaply into the hands of people who can reuse them as part of their recycle/ stategy...like 10 cents per watt or less. And then eventually those used panels are going to degrade to the point where they need to be thrown out, at that point they could be recycled... And to assist/encourage those off-grid homeowners to bring near dead panels in to recycle, there could be a 1 new for (5?) used panels trade-in coupon offered.

[SeanRice-rvml]

This is awesome work these guys are doing. I would like to mention that there is an initial problem with how we handle solar panels. End of life for solar panels is usually set at 25 years. But at that point the solar panels still have 87.5% of their original power. These are still very useful panels. I wish I could get some of these panels.

[ChinaChuck]

Matt, thank you for your wonderful research! This as with many of your other videos really brings encouragement from what could have been a gloomy and frightening problem in the future.

PS: last March my family became surf shark subscribers thanks to your code! Blessings and Merry Christmas

[freakonaleash]

Really cool stuff. I do wonder how they plan on recycling panels that have been damaged though. It seems like the system they showcased required fully intact panels to begin with. It would be interesting to see what they can do with panels that have been cracked, penetrated or even broken into pieces because, you know that once their junk people aren’t going to take care when removing them or shipping them out for recycling

[ravinloon]

There are thousands of industries where getting rid of excess heat is a daily issue... and here is one that needs heat as an expensive component of their process. Might be worth thinking outside the box... and seeing if a partnership could see two plants working side by side to benefit both.

[TheWebstaff]

Best use of old solar panels currently is to reuse them.

[mr.makeit]

Great video. The more that we can talk about circular economies the better. This is especially applicable to renewable energy such as solar panels.

[techtactics]

I have a solar energy business and deal with brand new and used panels. It's wrong to say there's no way to recycle them. There's actually a lot of recycling going on. We repurpose panels under 7-8 years, the rest get recycled just as shown in the video. It's an area I want to go into in the future. If you know what to look for, you'll find one of the major recycler and they actually show their processes too.

[rafaelramires]

Recycling is important as making the product itself easier to be recycled. I wish that was the modus poerandi from now on.

[Certago]

Legislating for recycling should give the industry the boost it needs.