Uploaded January 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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Solar was supposed to be the clean energy hero. But now a new crisis is building fast: solar panel waste. Most panels last 20 to 30 years, and the first big wave is aging out. That could mean up to 27 million tons of old panels soon, with around 80% going to landfills. In this video, we go inside a solar recycling facility in the French Alps to see how panels are “baked,” sorted, and chemically separated to recover valuable silver, copper, and silicon. Is this scalable before the waste tsunami hits?
#SolarEnergy #Recycling #CleanTech #Sustainability #RenewableEnergy