TY - JOUR
T1 - PV in the circular economy, a dynamic framework analyzing technology evolution and reliability impacts
AU - Ovaitt, Silvana
AU - Mirletz, Heather
AU - Seetharaman, Sridhar
AU - Barnes, Teresa
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors would like to thank Dirk Jordan for his expertise in reliability, Garvin Heath and Tim Silverman for their critique, and Acadia Hegedus for configuring the data for the Open Energy Information (OpenEI) supplemental page. This work was authored in part by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, operated by Alliance for Sustainable Energy, LLC, for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) under Contract No. DE-AC36-08GO28308. It was also supported in part by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Workforce Development for Teachers and Scientists (WDTS) under the Science Undergraduate Laboratory Internship (SULI). The views expressed in the article do not necessarily represent the views of the DOE or the U.S. Government. The U.S. Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the U.S. Government retains a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this work, or allow others to do so, for US Government purposes. Validation, Formal Analysis, Investigation, Writing (Original Draft), Writing (Review & Editing), H.M. and S.O.; Data Curation, Resources, H.M.; Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, S.O.; Supervision, Funding Acquisition, Writing (Review & Editing), T.B. and S.S. The authors declare no competing interests. One or more of the authors of this paper self-identifies as an underrepresented ethnic minority in science. While citing references scientifically relevant for this work, we also actively worked to promote gender balance in our reference list.
Funding Information:
The authors would like to thank Dirk Jordan for his expertise in reliability, Garvin Heath and Tim Silverman for their critique, and Acadia Hegedus for configuring the data for the Open Energy Information (OpenEI) supplemental page. This work was authored in part by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, operated by Alliance for Sustainable Energy, LLC, for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) under Contract No. DE-AC36-08GO28308. It was also supported in part by the U.S. Department of Energy , Office of Science, Office of Workforce Development for Teachers and Scientists (WDTS) under the Science Undergraduate Laboratory Internship (SULI). The views expressed in the article do not necessarily represent the views of the DOE or the U.S. Government. The U.S. Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the U.S. Government retains a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this work, or allow others to do so, for US Government purposes.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021
PY - 2022/1/21
Y1 - 2022/1/21
N2 - Rapid, terawatt-scale deployment of photovoltaic (PV) modules is required to decarbonize the energy sector. Despite efficiency and manufacturing improvements, material demand will increase, eventually resulting in waste as deployed modules reach end of life. Circular choices for decommissioned modules could reduce waste and offset virgin materials. We present PV ICE, an open-source python framework using modern reliability data, which tracks module material flows throughout PV life cycles. We provide dynamic baselines capturing PV module and material evolution. PV ICE includes multimodal end of life, circular pathways, and manufacturing losses. We present a validation of the framework and a sensitivity analysis. Results show that manufacturing efficiencies strongly affect material demand, representing >20% of the 9 million tons of waste cumulatively expected by 2050. Reliability and circular pathways represent the best opportunities to reduce waste by 56% while maintaining installed capacity. Shorter-lived modules generate 81% more waste and reduce 2050 capacity by 6%.
AB - Rapid, terawatt-scale deployment of photovoltaic (PV) modules is required to decarbonize the energy sector. Despite efficiency and manufacturing improvements, material demand will increase, eventually resulting in waste as deployed modules reach end of life. Circular choices for decommissioned modules could reduce waste and offset virgin materials. We present PV ICE, an open-source python framework using modern reliability data, which tracks module material flows throughout PV life cycles. We provide dynamic baselines capturing PV module and material evolution. PV ICE includes multimodal end of life, circular pathways, and manufacturing losses. We present a validation of the framework and a sensitivity analysis. Results show that manufacturing efficiencies strongly affect material demand, representing >20% of the 9 million tons of waste cumulatively expected by 2050. Reliability and circular pathways represent the best opportunities to reduce waste by 56% while maintaining installed capacity. Shorter-lived modules generate 81% more waste and reduce 2050 capacity by 6%.
KW - Energy policy
KW - Energy systems
KW - Environmental science
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85121130439&partnerID=8YFLogxK
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U2 - 10.1016/j.isci.2021.103488
DO - 10.1016/j.isci.2021.103488
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85121130439
VL - 25
JO - iScience
JF - iScience
SN - 2589-0042
IS - 1
M1 - 103488
ER -