Photovoltaic panels are essential tools for reducing the energy impact of buildings, industrial processes, and agriculture, since they generate energy using renewable sources such as the sun, thereby limiting the consumption of polluting fossil fuels.
The efficiency of these panels is constantly increasing, as is their adoption, which began to take hold in Italy in the early 2000s and has since experienced exponential growth. The increasing use of renewable and clean energy sources is undoubtedly great news, but it also requires solutions for disposing of decommissioned solar panels: solar systems installed twenty or twenty-five years ago are naturally reaching the end of their useful life, and it is easy to predict that in the coming years the number of discarded panels will grow significantly, requiring waste management companies to offer ever-more effective solutions for properly recycling these products and recovering the many valuable components inside them.
Regulations for the disposal of photovoltaic panels
Legislative Decree 49/2014, later confirmed by Ministerial Decree 40/2023, classifies photovoltaic panels as WEEE of type R4 and prohibits disposing of this type of waste in landfills before they have undergone adequate treatment, which is necessary to separate and remove potentially hazardous components and to sort recoverable materials for recycling.
The 2014 regulation marked a significant change in handling and recycling solar panels: previously, most damaged or retired panels were simply landfilled, with the only separation being the aluminum frame, which accounts for just 10% of the panel’s weight. With the new regulations and the introduction of more advanced treatment processes, it is now possible to recover up to 98% of a photovoltaic panel's components, recycling not only the external aluminum but also significant amounts of glass, plastic, silicon, copper, and other metals.
This type of treatment ensures obvious economic benefits, but not only that: properly managing decommissioned photovoltaic panels also prevents the release of small amounts of hazardous substances—such as lead, cadmium, gallium etc.—protecting public health and preventing pollution.
Why invest in a photovoltaic panel treatment facility
Given the large number of photovoltaic panels reaching the end of their life cycle, developing and designing customized facilities for treating this type of waste offers a multitude of benefits, such as:
- Recovery and reuse of valuable materials, such as silicon, copper, or other metals that have significant economic value and whose extraction processes are costly and environmentally impactful.
- Reduction of environmental impact by recycling the materials contained in the panels and separating hazardous components.
- Fostering virtuous cycles that have positive regional effects, since the individual recovered materials are sent to further recovery and recycling processes that feed secondary markets.
Photovoltaic panel recycling: how CAMEC transforms waste into resources
CAMEC offers advanced solutions for recycling photovoltaic panels by designing tailor-made plants that combine technology and sustainability. Here are the main processing stages that allow correct sorting and valorization of the materials in each panel:
- From disassembly to valorization: the process begins with the automated disassembly of the aluminum frames, separating them from the rest of the panel, followed by the delamination phase, in which the glass is removed without damaging other components. Once aluminum and glass are separated, the remaining panel material is sent directly to the crushing phase, which requires no further preliminary processing. This stage uses advanced machinery, such as CAMEC's GRR280 single-rotor crusher and TBR650 turbine, which reduce the material to an optimal size for subsequent separation and screening stages.
- Separation and recovery of materials: during screening, integrated size-control systems allow differentiation of materials such as silicon, plastic, and metals. Separation is achieved using advanced technologies, including multi-level vibrating separators and densimetric systems, which precisely distinguish different fractions. In this way, valuable materials are recovered, ready to be reintroduced into the production cycle, minimizing environmental impact and maximizing the value of technological waste.
CAMEC designs and builds customized plants for treating WEEE and photovoltaic panels: to learn more about the solutions we have developed in this field, contact us!
