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DOE OSTI · 1913960

Quantifying Energy Flows in PV Circularity Processes

Mirletz, Heather M. (ORCID:0000000250584804)·Ovaitt, Silvana (ORCID:000000030180728X)·Gaulding, Ashley (ORCID:0000000217721993)·Sridhar, Seetharaman·Barnes, Teresa (ORCID:0000000231540558)
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Abstract

As sustainable deployment and end-of-life management become a hot topic to timely address in the PV community, a dynamic comparative evaluation of the benefits of circular pathways such as reuse, and remanufacturing, recycling has not been performed holistically beyond material flows or LCA analysis. Energy flows are critical for evaluating energy generation technologies. Previously they have been used to compare renewables to fossil generation and then between PV technologies. This paper quantifies energy flows to evaluate circular pathways for PV. The energy flows tracking manufacturing, generation, and losses complementary to the mass flows of silicon are quantified leveraging the PV ICE framework.

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circular economyenergy flowsenergy return on investment (EROI)photovoltaicsrecycleremanufactureSOLAR ENERGY

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Mirletz, Heather M. (ORCID:0000000250584804), Ovaitt, Silvana (ORCID:000000030180728X), Gaulding, Ashley (ORCID:0000000217721993), Sridhar, Seetharaman, Barnes, Teresa (ORCID:0000000231540558). 2022-11-14. Quantifying Energy Flows in PV Circularity Processes. https://doi.org/10.1109/pvsc48317.2022.9938594

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