US to invest in domestic solar manufacturing, recycling

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has announced $52 million for 19 selected projects, including $10 million from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, to strengthen America’s domestic solar supply chain, and $30 million in funding for technologies that will help integrate solar energy into the grid. The investments are part of President Biden’s Investing in America agenda.  

The research, development and demonstration projects are designed to enhance domestic solar manufacturing, support recycling of solar panels and develop new American-made solar technologies. The investment will help promote cheaper, more efficient solar cells and advance cadmium telluride (CdTe) and perovskite solar manufacturing—two technologies the DOE says will diversify the solar supply chain. This investment plus others made since President Biden took office out the U.S. on track to increase domestic solar panel manufacturing capacity eightfold by the end of 2024, the DOE adds.

Investments in recycling through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law 

Eight projects to be selected for award negotiations through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will focus on reducing the cost and increasing the efficiency of panel recycling processes. As solar deployment increases, the end of life for photovoltaic (PV) components needs to be considered, the DOE says. Although 95 percent of a PV module is recyclable, the current economics of managing panels at end of life are unfavorable to recycling, according to DOE’s recent report. Modules designed for recycling will increase the percentage of materials that can be recovered during the recycling process and resold into the market, contributing to the domestic supply chain for materials that include silver and copper.

If an application is selected for award negotiations, the selection is not a commitment by DOE to issue an award or provide funding. DOE and the applicants will first undergo a negotiation process. Applicants do not receive funding until award negotiations are completed and the contracting officer executes the funding agreement. Before a funding agreement is executed, DOE may cancel award negotiations and rescind the selection for any reason.

Electroninks Inc., Austin, Texas, with an award amount of $750,000, will explore the use of new metal “inks” for adding conductive metal contacts to solar cells, providing a cheaper method that is compatible with multiple common solar cell technologies, including silicon, CdTe and perovskites.

Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, with an award amount of $1.5 million, will replace the silver in solar cell electrical contacts by developing new copper- and aluminum-based metal pastes that can be screen-printed onto silicon solar cells. These new pastes could reduce the cost of adding metal contacts to the cell by 50 percent and are compatible with common silicon solar cell technologies, the DOE says.

Locusview, Chicago, with an award amount of $750,000, will develop standards for tracing solar modules through the entire supply chain from raw material manufacturing through end-of-life management, with a specific focus on recycling and reusing the materials in the module.

Solarcycle Inc., Oakland, California, with an award amount of $1.5 million, will recover key materials from end-of-life solar panels by developing a mechanical method to concentrate the materials, followed by an environmentally friendly chemical process to recover them.

University of California Berkeley, with an award amount of $1.5 million, will develop materials to selectively remove a variety of metals from solar photovoltaic panels for reuse and recycling.

University of California San Diego, La Jolla, with an award amount of $1 million, will develop new materials to layer between the solar cell itself and the packaging layers of the solar module that can be “unzipped” to easily disassemble the module into its component materials for reuse and recycling.

University of Central Florida in Orlando, with an award amount of $1.5 million, will develop a new, cheaper, scalable process for adding copper metal electrical contacts in place of silver on silicon solar cells, using a laser to print lines of a copper onto the silicon layer.

University of Kansas in Lawrence, with an award amount of $1.3 million, will develop a new process to remove the outer layers and separate the valuable recyclables in CdTe solar cells using methods that maximize the quantity and quality of the recovered materials.

DOE says it has been a leader in CdTe research and launched, in partnership with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and First Solar, a research consortium focused on making CdTe cells less expensive and more efficient. 

Boosting domestic solar manufacturing 

The projects in the Solar Manufacturing Incubator program are designed to accelerate commercialization of product ideas to boost the U.S. solar supply chain. Two projects in Ohio will leverage $16 million in funding to test and demonstrate solutions for increasing the domestic manufacturing of CdTe PV technologies. The U.S. is the leader in CdTe technology, the second-most-common PV technology after silicon: 

• First Solar in Perrysburg has been awarded $7.3 million to develop a tandem module combining CdTe and silicon—a new residential rooftop product that is more efficient than silicon or thin-film modules on the market today, DOE says.
• Toledo Solar, also of Perrsyburg, will receive $8.8 million to demonstrate the application of semitransparent cadmium telluride (CdTe) solar panels to windows, addressing a new market for thin-film solar devices.

In addition, seven projects will derisk new technologies and manufacturing processes, bringing the solutions to the prototype stage and on the path to commercial success, DOE says: 

• BREK Electronics of Broomfield, Colorado, has been awarded $500,000 to develop a new inverter technology based on a silicon carbide transistor and high-frequency planar magnetics that can significantly lower the cost and size of grid-tied inverters.
• Guardian Devices of Albuquerque, New Mexico, will receive $900,000 to produce self-extinguishing PV connectors that will prevent fires in PV systems.
• LITESPEED Energy of Livermore, California, will receive $1.6 million to improve floating PV systems, making them more resilient to wind and waves.
• Makai Ocean Engineering in Waimanalo, Hawaii, will receive $600,000 to derisk a heat exchange for use in Generation 3 concentrating solar-thermal power systems.
• Mirai Solar of Mountainview, California, will receive $1.4 million to further develop and commercialize a foldable PV solar screen with variable shading and output power for controlled environment greenhouses.
• Mission Drives Corp. or Potsdam, New York, will receive $1.2 million to develop an inverter to switch electricity input 100 times faster than conventional products using silicon carbide and gallium nitride wide bandgap components.
• Vitro Flat Glass of Cheswick, Pennsylvania, will receive $1.6 million to improve the power output of CdTe modules through a high-performance superstrate, which is the glass on which a solar module is built.

Driving innovation in solar technology   

Two additional projects, totaling $18 million, in the PV Research and Development funding program will bring together teams of researchers from academia, industry and national labs to address the issues in perovskite solar cell devices that limit their durability, scale-up and efficiency. DOE says perovskites are a promising technology with the potential for quicker production compared with crystalline silicon cells.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge will receive $9 million to design, build and test commercially relevant tandem solar cells, which combine silicon and perovskite PV materials. The project team will research efficient module designs, create commercially relevant manufacturing methods and perform durability testing.

University of Colorado Boulder will receive $9 million to design and build tandem silicon-perovskite solar cells, comparing different manufacturing methods for the perovskite layer to minimize cost and maximize efficiency and durability. The center will consist of four universities, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and three American perovskite companies.

New funding for grid management tools 

The Operation and Planning Tools for Inverter-based resource Management and Availability in Future Power (OPTIMA) funding opportunity will award $30 million in funding for projects that address emerging challenges for grid planning operators and engineers to plan the future of the electric power grid and maintain its daily reliable operation.  

U.S. Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois says, “By building the solar energy supply chain here at home, we can create jobs, reduce our dependence on foreign critical minerals and fossil fuels, lower the cost of installing solar panels on homes and businesses, and protect our environment for generations to come. The important work of mapping the solar energy supply chain is happening in Illinois.”