PV Life Cycle Management and Recycling Overview & Prospects

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1 1 PV Life Cycle Management and Recycling Overview & Prospects Vasilis Fthenakis Center for Life Cycle Analysis, Columbia University and Photovoltaics Environmental Research Center, Brookhaven National Laboratory

2 2 The Economic Feasibility and Value of PV Recycling Sustainable PV Growth and the Value of Recycling Technical and Economic Feasibility of Recycling Projections Pathways for Increasing Value and Minimizing Cost

3 3 Recycling Addressing Concerns Market Customer Environmental Concerns Recycling

4 4 Large Scale PV Sustainability Criteria Photovoltaics are required to meet the need for abundant electricity generation at competitive costs, whilst conserving resources for future generations, and having environmental impacts lower than those of alternative future energyoptions Sustainability Metrics: Cost Resource Availability Environmental Impact

5 Large Scale PV Sustainability Criteria Low Cost Affordability in a competitive world Te in CdTe In in CIGS Ge in a-sige & III/V Ag in c-si Resource Availability Lower than alternatives Life Cycle Impacts & Risks Lowest Environmental Impact Zweibel, Mason & Fthenakis, A Solar Grand Plan, Scientific American, 2008 Fthenakis, Mason & Zweibel, The technical, geographical and economic feasibility for solar energy in the US, Energy Policy, 2009 Fthenakis, The sustainability of thin-film PV, Renewable & Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2009 Fthenakis, Sustainability metrics for extending thin-film PV to terawatt levels. MRS Bulletin,

6 Large Scale PV The Value of Recycling Low Cost Affordability in a competitive world Te in CdTe In in CIGS Ge in a-sige & III/V Ag in c-si Resource Availability Recycling Lower than alternatives Life Cycle Impacts & Risks Lowest Environmental Impact Zweibel, Mason & Fthenakis, A Solar Grand Plan, Scientific American, 2008 Fthenakis, Mason & Zweibel, The technical, geographical and economic feasibility for solar energy in the US, Energy Policy, 2009 Fthenakis, The sustainability of thin-film PV, Renewable & Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2009 Fthenakis, Sustainability metrics for extending thin-film PV to terawatt levels. MRS Bulletin,

Te (MT/yr) CdTe PV Production Constraints (based on material availability: primary+recycling) Tellurium Availability for PV (MT/yr) Annual Growth (GW/yr) 5000 High 200 Optimistic 4000 Low 150 3000

7 Te (MT/yr) CdTe PV Production Constraints (based on material availability: primary+recycling) Tellurium Availability for PV (MT/yr) Annual Growth (GW/yr) 5000 High 200 Optimistic 4000 Low Most likely Conservative 1000 Recycling every 30-yrs 10% loss in collection 10% loss in recycling Fthenakis V., Renewable & Sustainable Energy Reviews 13, 2746, 2009 Fthenakis V., MRS Bulletin, 37, 425,

8 Photovoltaic Modules Three common PV module types: 8

9 Recoverable Materials Value of Materials in PV Products Material Price ($/kg) Products Indium 700 CIGS Gallium 650 CIGS Silver 600* c-si Tellurium 100 CdTe Silicon 12** c-si Cadmium 4*** CdTe Germanium 1200 III/V, a-si Glass All Aluminum $1.6/kg * Silver has been as high as $1600/kg in the last decade CIGS also contains valuable molybdenum and selenium ** UMG grade: $12; 6N-8N: $20; Recovered Si wafers: $25-40/kg ***Cadmium has low intrinsic value, but there is value in avoiding hazardous waste disposal costs + Glass cullet prices range from $3 to $75/tonne depending on purity 9

10 Crystalline silicon PV recycling methods Frisson 2000

11 Crystalline silicon PV recycling methods Wambach

12 Crystalline silicon & thin-film recycling methods - Solvation Kang 2012 Palitzsch Kim 2012

13 Environmental Evaluation of c-si PV recycling Wambach et al., 3 rd Int PV Recycling Conf., Rome,

14 Thin Film PV Recycling - CdTe 14 Goozner et al / 5,997,718 / Dec 7, 1999

15 Spent H 2 SO 4 Solution Thin-film Recycling R&D at BNL: CdTe PV Modules PV Module Waste H 2 S O 4 H 2 O 2 Leach Device Removal of Cu from Liquid Using Resin M4195 Column I Cu Recycling of Spent Electrolyte Column II Cu Removal of Cd and Fe from Liquid Using Resin Amberlyst 15 Column I Cd, Fe Column II Cd, Fe Effluent Solution (Te) Glass Slurry Elution of Column M4195 Elution of Column Amberlyst 15 Sulfide Precipitation Tellurium Sulfides Filtration Facility Leachate Solution Elution Solution (Te, Cd, Cu, Fe) (Cu) CdSO 4 Cadmium Metal Clean Glass Cd Copper Recovery (?) Electrowinning Cell Fthenakis V. and Wang W., Separating Te from Cd Waste Patent No 7,731,920, June 8, 2010 Wang W. and Fthenakis V.M. Kinetics Study on Separation of Cadmium from Tellurium in Acidic Solution Media Using Cation Exchange Resin, Journal of Hazardous Materials, B125, 80-88, 2005 Fthenakis V.M and Wang W., Extraction and Separation of Cd and Te from Cadmium Telluride Photovoltaic Manufacturing Scrap, Progress in Photovoltaics, 14: ,

16 16 Pure Material Recovery Challenges & Perspectives Sulfuric acid leaching method yields a solution containing several impurities, e.g. Cu, Fe, Al, Na, Ca, Si, Mg, and other. Fe and Al are particularly troublesome. Production of high purity cadmium and tellurium products are compromised with the presence of so many contaminants The Glass-EVA separation is not complete precluding its reuse in flat glass manufacturing Current end-use of recycled glass: Beads, fiberglass at only $3-$30 /tonne Use as clean cullet in flat soda-lime glass would bring $50-$75 /tonne

17 Flat Glass Soda lime glass Made via Float Process Markets include: Architectural Photovoltaics Display Automotive 17

18 Glass (billion square meters) Projections of Glass Needs in PV 50 50% growth in PV per year 40% % 10 0 Year Current Flat Glass Capacity (billion sq m) Aggressive Annual Glass Consumption for PV (billion sq m) Most Likely Annual Glass Consumption for PV (billion sq m) Conservation Annual Glass Consumption for PV (billion sq m) Burrows and Fthenakis, Solar Materials and Solar Cells, in press 18

19 Projections of PV Waste in Europe* MW *EC DG ENV Report, Bio Intelligence Service,

20 Architectural Glass Recycling Glass (cullet) is already regularly recycled from internal and post industrial sources Pure cullet can be recycled into new float glass. Contaminated cullet can be downcycled into fiberglass Low concentration cullet (i.e. demolition waste) can be downcycled into aggregate. 20

21 Glass and PV: Scale of Systems LowE Glass Float Plant PV Manufacturing Plant Produces tons of glass per day Uses tons of recycled cullet 100 MW 1 GW per year ,000 m 2 panels per day Uses tons glass per day PV Field Roughly same size as 1 year of plant production 21

22 22 Remaining R&D Needs Glass-polymer separations (to enhance glass value) Prevent Glass contamination with metal CIGS recycling Design for the environment and reliability/longevity Assess recyclability of new PV types PV Recycling System (Collection+Recycling) Cost modeling

23 Model for CdTe PV Recycling Cost-Value Analysis * Process flow of CdTe PV Recycling Decision tree for various scenarios *Jun-Ki Choi and Vasilis Fthenakis, Journal of Industrial Ecology,

24 Conclusion Major PV Sustainability metrics include cost, resource availability, and environmental impacts These three aspects are closely

sustainable growth The technical and economic feasibility of recycling currently commercial PV modules is demonstrated Opportunities exist in

24 24 Conclusion Major PV Sustainability metrics include cost, resource availability, and environmental impacts These three aspects are closely related; recycling spent modules will become increasingly important in resolving cost, resource, and environmental constraints to large scales of sustainable growth The technical and economic feasibility of recycling currently commercial PV modules is demonstrated Opportunities exist in reducing recycling costs by improving the purity of recovered materials and optimizing system costs

Received 27 May 2005; Revised 16 August 2005

Received 27 May 2005; Revised 16 August 2005 PROGRESS IN PHOTOVOLTAICS: RESEARCH AND APPLICATIONS Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 1.12/pip.676 Broader Perspectives Extraction and Separation of Cd and Te from