Circular economy priorities for photovoltaics in the energy transition

Among the many ambitious decarbonization goals globally, the US intends grid decarbonization by 2035, requiring 1 TW of installed photovoltaics (PV), up from ~110 GW in 2021. This unprecedented global scale-up will stress existing PV supply chains with increased material and energy demands. By 2050,...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2022-09, Vol.17 (9), p.e0274351-e0274351
Main Authors: Mirletz, Heather, Ovaitt, Silvana, Sridhar, Seetharaman, Barnes, Teresa M
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Alternative energy
Alternative energy sources
Biology and Life Sciences
Circular economy
Closed-loop recycling
Decarbonization
Ecology and Environmental Sciences
Economic aspects
Economics
Electricity distribution
Energy
Energy industry
ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY
Energy transition
Engineering and Technology
Futures
glass
Laboratories
Life cycle analysis
Life cycles
Lifetime
Manufacturing
mass
Modules
Photovoltaic cells
Photovoltaic power generation
Photovoltaics
Physical Sciences
R&D
Recycling
Redesign
reliability
Renewable energy
Research & development
SOLAR ENERGY
Solar Futures
supply chain
Supply chains
Sustainability
Sustainable energy
virgin material demands
wastes
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Summary:Among the many ambitious decarbonization goals globally, the US intends grid decarbonization by 2035, requiring 1 TW of installed photovoltaics (PV), up from ~110 GW in 2021. This unprecedented global scale-up will stress existing PV supply chains with increased material and energy demands. By 2050, 1.75 TW of PV in the US cumulatively demands 97 million metric tonnes of virgin material and creates 8 million metric tonnes of life cycle waste. This analysis leverages the PV in Circular Economy tool (PV ICE) to evaluate two circular economy approaches, lifetime extension and closed-loop recycling, on their ability to reduce virgin material demands and life cycle wastes while meeting capacity goals. Modules with 50-year lifetimes can reduce virgin material demand by 3% through reduced deployment. Modules with 15-year lifetimes require an additional 1.2 TW of replacement modules to maintain capacity, increasing virgin material demand and waste unless >90% of module mass is closed-loop recycled. Currently, no PV technology is more than 90% closed-loop recycled. Glass, the majority of mass in all PV technologies and an energy intensive component with a problematic supply chain, should be targeted for a circular redesign. Our work contributes data-backed insights prioritizing circular PV strategies for a sustainable energy transition.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0274351