With all kinds of incentives for us to adopt solar power, there are still questions about the price and environmental cost of producing and disposing solar panels.
Remember when everyone started to wonder who was actually making cellphones, what was in them, and what we were going to do with them after they died? Well, that’s happening now, with solar panels.
“Solar and other new, emerging renewable technologies use the same types of processes as the electronics industry, and therefore they have pretty much the same environmental impact,” said Sheila Davis who directs the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition.
Davis is attempting to monitor the solar industry, especially the most common solar panels, which contain the chemicals silicon and cadmium telluride.
“The panels were at first made largely in Europe, in Germany and over the last five years, that manufacturing has shifted primarily to Asia and mostly China,” she said.
Davis is asking companies to self-report data for her annual "Solar Scorecard." It’s a one-page list, an infographic. Last year, a list of 40 solar manufacturers from the U.S. and abroad were ranked on emissions, working conditions and recycling. They received scores ranging from five to 77. The scorecard is an effort to let the public know how various manufacturers are producing panels. And investors are paying attention.
“We’re actually trying to organize investors from other parts of the world to join us in asking for higher standards, to participate in the Solar Scorecard and also encouraging to join the solar commitment,” she said.
Steven Heim, of Boston Common Asset Management, wants to pull back the curtain and reveal how companies make and dispose of solar panels, from their water and fuel consumption to how much waste they generate. And there’s plenty to learn from the electronics industry. In fact, former Apple innovator Steve Wozniak recently urged people at an energy summit to look beyond savings on electricity bills and think about the time it takes for a solar panel to recover the energy used to produce it.
“The amount that something costs is equal to all the parts that are in it plus the energy to combine them," Heim said. "Right down to the energy to dig the ores out of the earth. So the cost of something is the energy used.”
It’s a lot for a consumer to think about. But Boston Common Asset Management solar analyst Pam Hegarty encourages anyone thinking about installing solar to ask questions.
“If consumers ask the right questions to the installers, the installers can put the right pressure on the manufacturers and that can be a way that we can start to get change to happen throughout the supply chain,” Hegarty said.
Here are some of the right questions to ask: May I choose which manufacturer my panels come from? And what will I do with them in 20 years, when they stop working on my roof? We’re still waiting to see if panel manufacturers will take them back.
Read the scorecard:
