That's not true - basically no commercial solar panels contain rare earth metals (the place they're actually used is in permanent magnets in electric motors and

That's not true - basically no commercial solar panels contain rare earth metals (the place they're actually used is in permanent magnets in electric motors and generators for things like electric cars and wind turbines, maybe you were confusing that? But there's a lot of interest in eliminating those, e.g. e-motors). Solar panels don't rely on fossil fuels either - perhaps you're confused by reporting that currently they're produced using a fair bit of energy from coal etc.? But that is reducing and improving all the time as grids get greener.