Zero Landfill Solar Panel Recycling
100% recovery of useful materials and zero waste. The environmentally superior, full-service end-of-life solar panel recycling solution.
Cost-Competitive
Full-Service
Closed-Loop
At Comstock Metals, we provide a zero-landfill solution, and we recycle 100% of all useful materials used to make solar panels while keeping them out of landfills.
Our unique thermal process removes all glues and plastic laminates preventing these materials from entering landfills and winding up in downstream recovered materials.
Zero landfill means no part of the panel goes to a landfill during our process. Our goal is to ensure a safer, more efficient, and sustainable solar waste recycling solution.
- We serve customers large and small from as far away as Hawaii and Canada, and we accept all types of solar panels at our full-service recycling center in Silver Springs, NV.
- We accept PV panels directly from all generators, sourced from breakage and maintenance during construction, operation, replacement, or reenergizing, and we can also provide full-service logistics management that includes onsite decommissioning services and transportation to our facility.
- Connect with us today for a quote on your project.
Reliability
Predictability
Trust
The Problem
Environmental & Human Health Risk:
- An estimated 90% of discarded solar PV panels have been going to landfills.
- Leachate from discarded solar panels are a risk to public health and the environment.
- Some disposal methods still result in harmful materials going back into industrial reuse after destruction.
Recycling Standards in Development:
- The EPA, individual states, and the solar industry are working at various levels to develop effective standards for end-of-life solar panel management.
- Going above and beyond these requirements, we believe in providing a safe and reliable solution that protects public health, ends the practice of sending panels to landfills, and helps industry fulfil their objective of mitigating hazardous material risks.
Demand for Solar Panel Recycling Capacity:
- There is simply not enough industrial scale solar panel recycling capacity to meet the volume of solar waste generated.
- Existing disposal costs are and will continue to be historically uneconomic at large volumes.
- Increasingly solar generators seek a full-service end-of-life partner that can also efficiently manage decommissioning and transportation.
The Solution
Sufficiency:
- Providing a full-service, closed-loop solution that can process any type of PV panel.
- Ensuring no part of the solar panel goes to a landfill during the recycling process.
- Mitigating legacy liability issues and adhering to the best end of life practices.
- Ensuring sufficient solar panel recycling capacity to meet fast-growing demand as more solar panels reach the end of their useful life.
Costs & Full-Services:
- Tipping fees are charged when solar panels are delivered.
- Competitive or better than current disposal fees are based on customer waste profiles.
- Cost-competitive decommissioning and transportation services are available to meet full-service demand.
Compliance & Environmental Certainty:
- Providing transparent audit and compliance documentation.
- 100% recovery means 1) we are eliminating all of the potential contaminates from glue and plastics as Step 1 before material recovery and reuse, and 2) we recycle 100% of recoverable material from each solar panel we receive, with no part of the panel going to a landfill in our process.
Exponential Growth in End-of-Life Panels
The U.S. is on track to see 1 million metric tons of solar photovoltaic panels reach the end of their useful life by 2030 and an estimated 7.5 million to 10 million metric tons by 2050.
To put that into perspective, in the U.S. that’s roughly 33 million end-of-life solar panels by 2030 and between 247 million to 330 million panels by 2050.
It would take approximately 1008 football fields to hold the number of decommissioned solar panels expected in the market by 2030.
Collective number of football fields it would take to hold as much as 330 million solar panels by 2050:
Football Fields
Process: Manual or mechanical disassembly, sending all or parts of panels to landfills, and inefficiencies in these kinds of methods of “recycling” can mean “re-purposed” materials may still contain potentially harmful hazardous materials.
- In the Comstock Metals recycling process, we recover 100% of the recoverable materials from every solar panel we receive, while safely eliminating potential contaminates found in glue and plastic laminates before material recovery, and ensuring no part of the solar panel we receive goes to a landfill during our process.
- Today that material is glass pearls, aluminum flakes, and metal fines, containing 0% glue or plastic laminates.
- Fees and Services: Regardless of the destination, tipping fees are charged to dispose of end-of-life panels.
- The Comstock Metals’ full-service facility is located in Silver Springs, NV.
- We charge tipping fees upon receipt, which are competitive compared to current disposal methods.
- We also offer full-service end-of-life management from panel decommissioning at the project site and can manage transportation from your project to our facility at competitive rates.
- The Comstock Metals’ full-service facility is located in Silver Springs, NV.
The difference is in our technology-driven solution and our process. We safely eliminate plastic and separate scarce materials at the front end of our process, thus fulfilling our compliant, zero landfill promise. Comstock Metals’ process is the most efficient and truly sustainable solution available today to capture and recover scarce materials for responsible re-use.
Send Us Your Panels
We are currently accepting decommissioned solar panels at our first end-of-life facility in Silver Springs, NV from utilities, O&M (operation & maintenance) groups, solar engineers, consultants, contractors, and municipalities.
Newsroom
- Press Release
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Connect or Request a Quote
Let’s explore how we can partner with you to ensure the end-of-life for your solar panels is closed-loop and economically and environmentally sustainable. Send us an email today.
- P.O. Box 1118 Virginia City, Nevada 89440
- Recycling Center: 600 Lake Avenue, Silver Springs, NV 89429
- metals@comstockinc.com
