<story><title>Europe&apos;s first solar panel recycling plant opens in France</title><url>https://www.reuters.com/article/us-solar-recycling/europes-first-solar-panel-recycling-plant-opens-in-france-idUSKBN1JL28Z</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>walrus01</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s worth nothing that the economics of the labor to remove &amp;quot;old&amp;quot; solar panels, transport them, recycle them, and install new panels may not make sense. Current technology monocrystalline silicon stuff can be guaranteed to have 80% of its original STC (standard test condition) power output after 25 years. Usually at which time the panels will be long since paid off and whatever power they are making for the roof owner is free money.&lt;p&gt;80% of original test-conditions rated power is still a lot - if you were to theoretically install a 40kW rated array composed of about 112, 360W panels, that would still be a 32kW array after 25 years.</text></comment>
<story><title>Europe&apos;s first solar panel recycling plant opens in France</title><url>https://www.reuters.com/article/us-solar-recycling/europes-first-solar-panel-recycling-plant-opens-in-france-idUSKBN1JL28Z</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>the-pigeon</author><text>This seems odd to me. Solar panels should last at least 30 years but we&amp;#x27;ve been finding most just keep working, potentially for decades longer.&lt;p&gt;While the power they produce degrades with time, it&amp;#x27;s not enough to be worth junking the panel.&lt;p&gt;Basically no solar panels should be recycled unless they are completely non-functional or faulty.&lt;p&gt;My guess is this plant will be dealing almost entirely with damaged panels and not end of life panels. Or they hope to trick people into recycling perfectly good but old panels, which is not eco-friendly at all.</text></comment>