4.6B Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment

Re:4.6B Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment by nradov on Thursday July 10, 2025 @06:09AM (#44519303)

Solar panel recycling has never really been done at scale. And a country would need fairly advanced manufacturing capabilities first before they could conduct that recycling.

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Re:4.6B Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment by adrianN on Thursday July 10, 2025 @07:20AM (#44519732)

Are old solar panels available at scale? They last for decades.

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Re:4.6B Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment by lnsru on Thursday July 10, 2025 @08:27AM (#44520226)

First 15-20 years old Siemens panels come off the roofs right now in Germany. Still having 2/3 of the rated power generation capability. Absolutely fascinating thing. And since they cost more or less nothing it would make absolutely sense to install them in some lower cost of living area in southern Europe. I can get the panels in Germany, who wants to take over the southern Europe part?

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Re:4.6B Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment by hnaccount_rng on Thursday July 10, 2025 @11:50AM (#44522344)

They are also old technology and only about half as efficient as current ones. So even if you restore them to full nameplate capacity for free they are still wasted to put anywhere as long as the installation price is dominated by labor costs. The _only_ scenario in which this might be worth it is if there are no new solar cells available

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Re:4.6B Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment by marcosdumay on Thursday July 10, 2025 @12:08PM (#44522556)

Yep. Those will still not be available for recycling.

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