Clusters of solar panels glistening in the sun have become more common across the United States as the solar industry has seen rapid growth over the past decade. Solar panels can be found nearly everywhere: perched in roadside fields or mounted on the rooftops of businesses and homes.
Just like wind turbines, solar panels are a growing and evolving form of renewable energy. The way solar panel modules are manufactured, however, can present challenges when it comes to recycling or reusing their materials. This is especially true as the components in the first generation of panels near their end-of-life expectancy.
Most solar panels have a life expectancy of 25-30 years. And as the solar market grows, so will the volume of photovoltaic (PV) panels in need of disposal. By 2030, the U.S. is expected to have a total of as much as 1 million tons of solar panel waste. By 2050, the U.S. is expected to have the second largest number of end-of-life panels in the world, with as many as an estimated 10 million total tons of panels, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
What Is in a Solar Panel?
Solar technology works by converting sunlight into electrical energy that can be used to generate electricity or stored in batteries or using thermal storage. When the sun shines onto a solar panel, energy from the sunlight is absorbed by PV cells in the panel. This energy creates electrical charges that move in response to an electrical field in the cell, causing electricity to flow.
Each solar panel is constructed from multiple layers and components, including PV cells, which are typically made from silicon. These cells are protected by layers of tempered glass, encapsulating materials, and a protective backsheet or glass layer, all supported by a durable aluminum frame. A complete solar energy system also includes components such as inverters, wiring, electrical protection equipment and racking systems.
Most of this material can be recycled, such as the glass and aluminum frame, which make up 80% of a typical PV panel. The difficulty lies with dismantling it. That’s because adhesives and sealants used to protect the panels from external elements make breaking them apart challenging.
Another challenge is the small amounts of hazardous materials and heavy metals such as lead, cadmium, arsenic and silver that are found in most panels. These materials are toxic and can leach into the soil or groundwater if tossed into a landfill. The U.S. Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) sets rules on how to responsibly manage and dispose of the materials.
More than 85% of a typical solar panel is made from materials such as glass and aluminum that are recyclable, and some advanced recycling processes can recover up to approximately 95% of a panel’s mass. While materials such as glass, aluminum and copper are relatively straightforward to recover, polymers and the small amounts of materials contained within the solar cells can be more challenging to separate and recycle.
Regulations: Refurbish, Reuse or Recycle
Just as cellphones and laptops can be refurbished, solar panels also can be restored and given second lives for use elsewhere. This involves a vendor having a program to accept the panels and then refurbish them in order to reuse them in other capacities; a panel no longer viable for use at a utility’s solar farm, for example, could be repurposed for reuse at a private residence.
Solar panel buyback and reuse programs are already in place overseas. In the European Union, a Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment directive requires any importer or manufacturer of PV panels to collect and treat the panels at their end of life. French environmental solutions provider Veolia has customers across Europe and already has a robust PV panel recycling program in place.
In the U.S., no federal regulations currently exist that would require PV module recycling, but the unlawful disposal of any hazardous waste within the panels can result in hefty fines. Federal law does regulate disposal if the panels are hazardous waste. End-of-life PV modules may be subject to RCRA if they exhibit hazardous characteristics, such as leachable lead or cadmium. In that case, they must be managed under applicable hazardous waste requirements, whether they are recycled or disposed. The EPA states that solar panels that are hazardous waste must follow RCRA requirements. In March 2022, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) released an action plan that provides a five-year strategy outlining research, stakeholder outreach, data collection and analysis to help establish safe, responsible and economic end-of-life practices for PV products.
Federal rulemaking is moving toward universal-waste treatment. The EPA has been working on rules to add certain end-of-life solar panels to the universal waste regulations under RCRA, which would make collection, storage, transport and recycling easier than managing panels as hazardous waste in every case.
As part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the DOE’s office for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy made $20 million available to eligible entities such as institutions of higher education, nonprofits or other organizations for research, development, demonstration and commercialization projects. The goal is to come up with innovative and practical ways to increase the reuse and recycling of solar energy technologies. DOE funding is supporting recycling research & development. It selected projects under its Materials, Operation and Recycling of Photovoltaics funding program to improve PV life cycle management, including reducing recycling costs and strengthening circular-economy practices.
Separately, the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), the national trade association for the U.S. solar industry, has been working with solar panel recycling partners since 2016. Most recently, SEIA released a circular economy road map in July 2025 and launched SolarRecycle.org in October 2025 to support end-of-life management for solar and storage equipment.
State and Private Solar Recycling Programs
As the federal government works through its strategy, some states are taking active steps to keep renewable energy components out of landfills. For example, California specifies the material in PV panels as universal waste. The designation streamlines waste management options so the material must be recycled and reused. North Carolina, New Jersey, Washington, Hawaii and Arizona are also moving legislation forward requiring end-of-life recycling of panels or the creation of buyback programs.
States are getting more active. The NC Clean Energy Technology Center reported that solar decommissioning and recycling mandates expanded significantly in 2025, with many states now addressing decommissioning plans, financial assurance and “recycling where practicable.”
Recyclers are improving recovery of high-value materials, too. Recent industry reporting points to better glass separation, silicon recovery and silver/silicon concentrate recovery — especially because aluminum, copper, silicon and silver drive the economics of PV recycling.
In the private sector, We Recycle Solar is one company that partners with manufacturers in need of PV material disposal services. Based out of Phoenix, We Recycle Solar has a footprint in several U.S. cities as well as others in Belgium, Japan and South Korea.
FabTech Solar Solutions is another Arizona-based solar recycling and refurbishing company that will credit customers for modules that are no longer of use to them but still hold some monetary value. First Solar is a key player in manufacturer-led recycling. It describes itself as having global in-house PV recycling capabilities, facilities in multiple countries, and more than 15 years of industrial-scale recycling experience.
However, the economics are still challenging. Recycling a utility-scale module in the U.S. can cost much more than landfilling, so policy support, landfill restrictions, extended producer responsibility or improved silver/silicon recovery may be needed to close the cost gap.
Next-generation panel recycling is also advancing. Researchers have demonstrated water-based or green-solvent recycling approaches for perovskite solar cells, including methods that can recover and reuse valuable components with high efficiency.
Bottom line: Solar panel recycling is moving from a niche disposal issue into a major regulatory and infrastructure focus, but the biggest near-term barriers remain cost, transportation, material separation and lack of consistent national requirements. As the number of solar projects continues to grow, it is just as important to expand the ways in which raw materials inside solar panels are reused or recycled.
Editor’s note: This post was originally published April 13, 2022, and has been updated for context and accuracy.