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The first generation of solar panels will wear out. A recycling industry is taking shape
Associated Press ^ | August 1, 2023 | Isabelle O’Malley

Posted on 08/01/2023 12:42:55 PM PDT by Olog-hai

Sunlight beats down on a graveyard for dead solar panels in Yuma, Arizona, hundreds stacked in neat piles, waiting for their next life. The great majority of worn and damaged panels are still dumped in landfills. But with more and more piling up, many people know that needs to change.

In this desert city where Arizona, California, Sonora and Baja California meet, North America’s first utility-scale solar panel recycling plant has opened to address what founders of We Recycle Solar call a “tsunami” of solar waste. Plans to address climate change rely on massively scaling up clean, solar electricity.

The panels, stacked and banded, come here from the company’s main collection warehouse in Hackettstown, New Jersey, plus six other locations across the country. […]

Solar panels are built to withstand decades of harsh weather, so it’s difficult to break the resilient bonding that keeps them together. Separating the glass without it shattering, for example, is a challenge. But with robotic suction arms assisted by workers, they come apart.

Some of the highest value materials are copper, silver, aluminum, glass, and crystalline silicon. Repurposing these means finding new uses for them, such as selling glass to companies that do sandblasting. …

(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Weird Stuff
KEYWORDS: climatechange; climatechangehoax; globalwarming; globalwarminghoax; homesolar; obamalegacy; scam; solar; solarpanels; solyndra
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To: Cowgirl of Justice

They were $25k and the company financed them 0% interest for 10 years. She said they last 10 years and will then need to replace them. Her financed monthly amount is $208 per month - much more than my power bill.

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Math is hard.


21 posted on 08/01/2023 2:55:29 PM PDT by Graybeard58 (Celebrating 42 years of sobriety this year, thank you Heavenly Father.)
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To: 21twelve

Glass is made from sand, the most common element on earth and available almost free. Why would anyone be stupid enough to spend money to grind up the glass and turn it back into sand?


22 posted on 08/01/2023 3:27:00 PM PDT by cyclotic
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To: Boomer

It’s actually just a rendering of a solar farm in Australia.....but that’s the plan and I fully expect it to come to fruition.


23 posted on 08/01/2023 3:32:57 PM PDT by V_TWIN (America...so great even the people that hate it refuse to leave!)
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To: Boomer

https://www.sciencealert.com/world-s-largest-solar-farm-to-pipe-power-internationally-from-australia-under-the-sea


24 posted on 08/01/2023 3:33:35 PM PDT by V_TWIN (America...so great even the people that hate it refuse to leave!)
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To: V_TWIN

I don’t know how they can call that clean energy. I guess they don’t know what goes into making solar panels and then every 20-30 years, what it takes to recycle them.

I can’t imagine the cost to replace every panel in this array.


25 posted on 08/01/2023 5:34:53 PM PDT by Boomer (Twitter is NOT a free speech platform. The scummy Marxists are back in charge. )
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To: steve86

IMHO, off grid is the only location that makes sense for solar.


26 posted on 08/01/2023 5:51:27 PM PDT by House Atreides (I’m now ULTRA-MAGA. -PRO-MAX’of )
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To: Olog-hai

Wouldn’t be cheaper to grind up the panels into dust and separate by composition (glass in one pile, copper in another, etc...)?


27 posted on 08/01/2023 5:55:11 PM PDT by fini
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To: steve86

The neighbor told me they were 10 yr solar panels and that they would have to be replaced then. I am sure the solar panel companies have made adjustments so they HAVE to be replaced much like the kitchen appliances that used to last decades but only last a few years now.


28 posted on 08/01/2023 6:57:47 PM PDT by Cowgirl of Justice
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