A new SINTEF Industry study estimates secondary silicon recovered from end-of-life crystalline silicon PV modules could support 35.6 GW to 62.9 GW of new solar manufacturing capacity in the European Union by 2040, though researchers say Europe’s limited ingot and wafer industry remains the key bottleneck.
Nagarajan Somi Ganesan, a researcher at SINTEF Industry, said the European Union could generate between 71.4 kilotons and 125.8 kilotons of secondary silicon from end-of-life crystalline silicon PV waste by 2040, enough to manufacture an estimated 35.6 to 62.9 GW of new PV capacity. SINTEF is one of Europe’s largest independent research institutes, based in Norway.
Somi Ganesan said Europe’s ability to utilize recovered silicon domestically depends on the successful expansion of its upstream PV supply chain.
“Several ingot and wafer projects, including Sunwaf in Spain (20 GW) and BEE Solar/Huasun in Italy (3 GW), indicate growing manufacturing capacity,” he said. “If realized, recovered silicon from end-of-life PV modules could help reduce reliance on primary silicon.”
He said that while recovered silicon’s current purity level (2N-3N) is already suitable for applications like Al-Si alloys and silicones, putting it to higher-value use in PV manufacturing itself will require Europe to build out further upgrading and refining capabilities.
Sunwaf is targeting 20 GW in Spain, with construction expected to begin in 2027 and commercial operations set for early 2029. A 3 GW ingot and wafer facility under BEE Solar or Huasun in Italy could not be confirmed. Documented Huasun-linked activity in Italy relates to approximately 1 GW of tandem and module production rather than upstream ingot and wafer capacity.
The study’s forecast depends heavily on assumed silicon recovery and refining efficiencies. Somi Ganesan said the paper assumes a 75% recovery efficiency and a subsequent 75% refining efficiency to upgrade recovered silicon to polysilicon grade.
“These values are based on published literature and represent plausible future performance rather than current industry-wide practice,” he said. “To account for uncertainty, the interactive EoL-PV dashboard developed from this work allows users to vary recovery and refining efficiencies and directly assess their impact on the projected results.”
The study’s net waste estimates come in below some other widely cited EU forecasts, a gap Somi Ganesan attributed to methodology rather than more optimistic underlying assumptions about gross waste generation.
“The main reason our estimates differ from some widely cited EU PV waste forecasts is that we report net EoL PV waste, not just gross waste generation,” he said. “While gross waste estimates are broadly comparable (4.63-10.63 Mt by 2040 in our study versus 5.0-9.8 Mt reported by Kastanaki et al. (2025)), our net estimates account for an 85% collection rate and the reuse of a share of younger modules. Specifically, we assume that 50% of collected modules younger than 15 years are refurbished and redeployed for a second life of at least 10 years. As a result, these modules do not enter the waste stream during the 2020-2040 period, leading to lower net waste quantities than forecasts that consider only gross EoL generation.”
Asked which assumption, collection efficiency or second-life reuse, has the greater effect on the study’s projections, Somi Ganesan said second-life reuse carries more weight.
“Second-life reuse has a greater impact because it delays waste generation beyond 2040, whereas collection efficiency only affects the fraction of waste entering the formal collection system,” he said.
The scientists discussed their findings in “Future crystalline silicon PV waste generation and secondary silicon availability in the European Union,” which was published in Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells, Volume 307 (December 2026). The research team included Somi Ganesan, as well as colleagues Birgit Ryningen, Berhane Darsene Dimd, Yijiang Xu, and Martin Bellmann.
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