Abstract
The photovoltaic (PV) sector has undergone both major expansion and evolution over the last decades, and currently, the technologies already marketed or still in the laboratory/research phase are numerous and very different. Likewise, in order to assess the energy and environmental impacts of these devices, life cycle assessment (LCA) studies related to these systems are always increasing. The objective of this paper is to summarize and update the current literature of LCA applied to different types of grid-connected PV, as well as to critically analyze the results related to energy and environmental impacts generated during the life cycle of PV technologies, from 1st generation (traditional silicon based) up to the third generation (innovative non-silicon based). Most of the results regarded energy indices like energy payback time, cumulative energy demand, and primary energy demand, while environmental indices were variable based on different scopes and impact assessment methods. Moreover, the review work allowed to highlight and compare key parameters (PV type and system, geographical location, efficiency), methodological insights (functional unit, system boundaries, etc.), and energy/environmental hotspots of 39 LCA studies relating to different PV systems, in order to underline the importance of these aspects, and to provide information and a basis of comparison for future analyses.
Highlights
The solar photovoltaic (PV) market for electricity generation has developed strongly in the recent years
The results showed that the substitution of glass with PET reduced the environmental burden in all impact categories (CC, human toxicity potential (HTP), land occupation (LO), NLT, particulate matter (PM), Fossil depletion (FD)); the use of steel was a main contributor in most categories, especially FD and climate change (CC) (HH)
The results showed that lifetimes greater than one year and efficiency higher than 1% are needed for these systems to be less impactful from the energy and environmental points of view
Summary
The solar photovoltaic (PV) market for electricity generation has developed strongly in the recent years. Based on last published data, 102.4 GW of grid-connected PV panels were installed globally in 2018, and this value corresponds to the total PV capacity available in the world in 2012. This result leads to a total global solar power capacity of more than 500 GW in 2018 (solar world capacity installed had reached 400 GW in 2017). With the exception of United States, where the new solar capacity installed was stable (10.6% in 2017 and 2018), the other main contributors installed less than the previous year: China 44 GW (16% less than 2017), India 8.3 GW (16% less than 2017), and Japan 6.6 GW Australia was the world’s fifth largest market in 2018, adding 5.3 GW, up to 295% more than
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