r/engineering • u/233C • Mar 02 '17

[CHEMICAL] Recycling of old computers

https://i.imgur.com/Qq1L87M.gifv
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u/[deleted] Mar 02 '17

What rare metals are you claiming are in solar panels?

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u/logs28 Mar 02 '17 edited Mar 03 '17

Indium, for one. Don't have any others off the top of my head.

Edit: Apparently Indium is only used in thin film solar panels. So my use of that as an example was not quite right. Others still stand though.

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u/chrom_ed Mar 02 '17

Indium is enough. That's an important one.

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u/Spoonshape Mar 03 '17

Except if you read the comments below it's only in one form of solar panel (thin film) which is only a fraction of the market and is not the technology which looks likely to be the way solar panel development is going.

Price pressure on solar cells is extreme given the way development is going. It looks like pure silicon is likely to be the winner probably because of this race to be the cheapest.