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Abstract With the increased deployment of solar photovoltaic (PV), the cadmium telluride (CdTe) PV market is expected to grow substantially. CdTe PV production is crucial for the clean energy transition but problematic because of the material availability challenges. CdTe PV relies on tellurium, a scarce metal mainly produced as a byproduct of copper. Several studies investigated the availability of tellurium for CdTe PV. However, previous models are static and do not reflect the interconnection between tellurium supply, demand, and price. Despite the efforts, previous studies have inconsistent results and do not provide a clear understanding on the availability of tellurium for CdTe PV applications. This study uses system dynamics modeling to assess tellurium availability between 2023 and 2050. The model considers different scenarios for CdTe PV demand growth and PV material intensity reduction. The model also considers tellurium supply variables such as Te‐rich ores, tellurium yield from anode slimes, and growth in copper mining. The historical data (2000–2020) analysis shows a negative correlation between the tellurium price and the annual tellurium surplus. All the considered demand scenarios exhibit a tellurium supply gap where annual material production falls below demand. Tellurium availability and price could delay the growth of CdTe PV production, and maintaining the current CdTe PV market share of ~4% will be challenging. The low‐demand scenario, which is based on a constant CdTe PV market share, results in a supply gap starting in 2029 and a supply gap peak of 508 metric tons in 2036. Our work shows that having more manufacturing capacity is insufficient if tellurium is unavailable. More importantly, this work shows that fast growth in CdTe PV production can diminish the advantages of dematerialization. The estimated cumulative CdTe PV production by 2050 ranges between 929 and 2250 GWp. The findings also suggest that recycling retired solar panels can contribute to 17% of the total tellurium demand and 34% of the CdTe PV tellurium demand. Sensitivity analysis shows that expanding existing Te‐rich ores does not alleviate tellurium scarcity. Alternatively, improving tellurium yield from copper electrorefining is a more efficient mitigation approach. The system dynamic approach outlined in this study provides a better perspective on the status of various critical metal supply chains, ultimately leading to sustainable materials management and increasing CdTe production.
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Material Requirement and Resource Availability for Silicon Photovoltaic Laminate Manufacturing in the Next 10 Years
Material scarcity is a considerable threat to energy transition towards renewables. Photovoltaics (PV) installations are expected to increase rapidly in the next decade, which may increase the amount of material needed. This study created three scenarios (S 1 , S 2 , & S 3 ) to evaluate the impacts of potential technology improvements on the quantity of materials necessary for manufacturing silicon PV (Si PV) laminate in the next ten years. Our baseline was similar to previous studies, which applied theoretical models on PV historical data and ignored PV technology improvements that can influence future material projections. S 1 considered only market share and module efficiency, while S 2 covered wafer thickness improvements as well. S 3 was the scenario that more likely will occur in the next decade, which included module efficiency, market share, wafer thickness, glass thickness, and potential replacements such as using perovskite/silicon tandem. The material requirement for Si PV laminate manufacturing in S 3 was 22% to 78% lower than the baseline, S 1 , and S 2 . The highest material demand is expected to be for solar glass (74 million metric tons) and Metallurgical grade silicon (3 million metric tons) in the next decade. This study showed the importance of considering technology improvements to project the PV material requirement.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1801785
- PAR ID:
- 10378313
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- 2021 IEEE 48th Photovoltaic Specialists Conference (PVSC)
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 1768 to 1772
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Conference Paper:
- https://doi.org/10.1109/PVSC43889.2021.9518663
