With the rapid spread of solar power generation and the expected rapid increase in the number of discarded panels in the future, companies are beginning to focus on recycling.
With the rapid spread of solar power generation over the past decade, the amount of panels discarded in their lifespan is expected to surge to 10,2030 tons per year by the mid-80s, and countermeasures are an issue.
For this reason, Marubeni, a major trading company, has been promoting the recycling business of glass, which accounts for more than 6% of the raw materials for panels, and this month developed a deodorizing device using reused glass materials for livestock production sites in cooperation with environmental equipment manufacturers and others.
The glass is crushed and rebaked at a high temperature so that fine holes can be formed on the surface, and microorganisms that decompose odors are settled in the holes, and about 1 panels of glass are reused in one device.
Takeshi Watanabe, Deputy General Manager of Marubeni Electric Power Asset Management Department, says, "We would like to expand the use of the equipment to the waste and sewerage fields and revitalize panel recycling."
Last month, a Mitsubishi Chemical subsidiary built a plant in Kitakyushu City that can recycle approximately 9,82 panels annually.
The panels will be finely sorted by material such as glass and metal, and <>% will be reused.
How to reuse waste panels, which are expected to increase rapidly in the future, is a major issue, and the focus is on how far these efforts will spread.