Led by RMIT University and funded through the Australian Government's International Clean Innovation Researcher Networks (ICIRN) program, the Integrating End-of-Life (EoL) Solar Panel Waste in a Circular Economy Model project addresses one of the most pressing challenges of the global energy transition: the responsible recovery and upcycling of decommissioned solar panels. RMIT was awarded a competitive grant to build this international network, uniting a transnational consortium of chemical engineers, materials scientists, policy analysts, and entrepreneurs across four continents. Australian partners include Second Life Solar, Universal Vortex Industries, Blue Tribe Group, and HP Energy. Global partners include New York University and the RAND Corporation (USA), the National Physical Laboratory of India, King's College London (UK), and the University of Castilla-La Mancha and solar industry firm EDIPAE (Spain). Research partners are developing state-of-the-art electrochemical, thermal, and selective dissolution processes to recover and upcycle solar panel waste into materials of equivalent or superior value, including new solar panels, batteries, construction materials, and aerospace components. This work enables the environmental isolation and value-added use of hazardous materials such as lead and fluorinated polymers.

What distinguishes this project is the depth of its research-to-industry integration. Industry partners are actively developing circular economy business models that identify viable end-of-life panels for direct reuse as a commercial alternative to recycling, while others are advancing the remanufacturing of recovered materials into new products. Solar panel samples sourced through Australian and Spanish partners have enabled cross-jurisdictional compositional analysis, strengthening the scientific rigour of recovery protocols across regional supply chains. Emerging joint ventures around CO₂ capture technology, and the rollout of Australian reuse models in Spain, demonstrate the project's capacity to build new international and bilateral commercial relationships. These outcomes are being formalised through two flagship knowledge products: a comprehensive technical report with over 30 expert authros from across the globe titled Toward an Australian Circular Economy for Solar Photovoltaic Technologies, and an accompanying White Paper which will equip Australian policymakers, industry leaders, and researchers worldwide with an authoritative evidence base for scaling solar circular economy solutions.