That article is really misleading. It starts off talking about the need to recycle cadmium-based panels in order not to leech toxic cadmium into the environment

That article is really misleading. It starts off talking about the need to recycle cadmium-based panels in order not to leech toxic cadmium into the environment, and then claims that recyling isn't economically viable - but if you click through the links, that claim is based on the economics of recycling Si-based panels that don't contain any cadmium. Indeed, the whole reason Si panels aren't economically viable to recycle is because they don't contain these kinds of exotic (and toxic) materials; recycling of the cadmium-containing panels is very much viable and commonplace.