Chinese Solar Panel Pollution

According to new research china s coal driven air pollution is significantly reducing the output of solar panels by dimming the sun.

Chinese solar panel pollution. At a three day international solar panel exhibition in may hundreds of solar panel manufacturers and buyers convened in shanghai. New research published in the journal nature energy suggests the country s densely polluted atmosphere is blocking the sun s rays preventing solar panels from harvesting energy efficiently. Solar industry and research scientists with the german stuttgart institute for photovoltaics. Panels produced in china which relies heavily on coal for power have a larger carbon footprint than those produced in europe.

But the view from solar panel factories is sometimes a little different. Symbolic of an era of new energy the solar industry presents a bright and clean image to the world. They also contain lead cadmium and other toxic even carcinogenic chemicals that cannot be removed without breaking apart the entire panel. Solar panels generate 300 times more toxic waste per unit of energy than nuclear power plants.

Protests last month exposed pollution problems at a manufacturing site in zhejiang province which according to industry insiders are just the tip of the iceberg. China is the world s largest market for both photovoltaics and solar thermal energy since 2013 china has been the world s leading installer of solar photovoltaics pv. The cost of a kilogram of silicon crystal stands at about us 13 this year. Rather the quotes come from a senior chinese solar official a 40 year veteran of the u s.

Smog smothers solar energy in china 2003 2014 png on some hazy days particularly in winter china s skies are blanketed by white and gray clouds of air pollutants. Recycling china s vast numbers of solar panels could prove to be expensive and time consuming. Solar panel manufacturers need electricity and thermal energy and carbon emissions from their generation can vary widely with location. In 2017 china was the first country to pass 100 gw of cumulative installed pv capacity and by the end of 2018 it had 174.

In 2015 china became the world s largest producer of photovoltaic power narrowly surpassing germany. China is halting construction on new coal powered plants that emit the hazardous pollutants that often choke cities in a thick blanket of toxic smog. Chinese air pollution dimmed sunlight enough to impact solar panels. Worse rainwater can wash many of these toxics out of the fragments of solar modules over time.