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Do you mean as the backing or bulk material? AFAIK photovoltaic cells with the electricity producing junction made of pure silicon do not exist. Don't know how
by labawi 7y ago
Do you mean as the backing or bulk material?
AFAIK photovoltaic cells with the electricity producing junction made of pure silicon do not exist. Don't know how much of non-silicon is there, but arsenic from GaAs cells is not something you want in your soil either.
As for WEEE, I hope most of the cells are returned and recycled or somehow properly disposed of, but not all will be collected, and there will be breakage, maybe even leakage of acid-rain digested cells. Also, even now, the collected e-waste is not really processed in a environmentally friendly way.
- philipkglass 7y agoThe cells are made of purified, doped silicon. That means very pure crystalline silicon modified with tiny additions of boron and phosphorus. A chemist would consider them "pure" silicon -- they are more than 99.99% silicon. About 95% of solar module manufacturing uses silicon cells. The remaining ~5% is split between thin film cadmium telluride modules and an even smaller volume of copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) thin film modules. GaAs cells are far too expensive for terrestrial use.