E-waste regulation’s impact on solar: Error or a conscious decision?

A Task Force was constituted by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC), and Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) to draft a policy framework for adopting a circular economy in solar energy. Various experts, leading industry associations and technical institutions were part of the task force. In fact, the MNRE organised several virtual consultations based on reactions received and finally, the MoEFCC included Solar PV modules (panels) and cells in its revised draft E-waste rules vide Gazette on May 19, 2022.

The MOEFCC notified E-waste regulations 2022 on November 2, 2022 and they come into effect from April 1, 2023.

In this draft, there is a complete section, therein, on solar PV. We now have an extended producer obligation on all solar module manufacturers. They need to team up with recyclers or recycle the end-of-life e-waste by themselves. The whole recycling regime is governed by traceable certificates – which monitors compliance with recycling obligations of solar PV manufacturers.  While this is a very welcome move, domestic solar manufacturers will now need to price this into the module sale price and collect this upfront from Developers/buyers – at the time of sale. Expect module prices to go up to the extent of this cost of recycling and the cost of compliance with these obligations.

The extended producer obligation framework in our E-Waste Regulations 22 has been modelled after European – ROHS standards and this is a good benchmark to emulate.  However, we seem to have bench-marked it rather blindly, resulting in some pretty serious and hopefully inadvertent consequences.

Rule 16 (1) specifies the Chemical Content requirements for Electronic and Electrical Equipment (EEE) for solar PV cells and modules.   Under this, any solar module which uses Lead or Cadmium above the prescribed cannot be produced or sold in India. The limits are 0.1% lead and 0.01% Cd by weight in homogenous material. It is understood that, based on the EU definition of homogeneous material,  that most Mono PERC and Thin Film PV modules would exceed these limits This therefore implies that most of the mono-perc and thin-film modules  being produced in India will be in violation of this regulation.

PV modules sold globally do not have such restrictive regulations. For example, the US and China do not regulate their PV Waste as generally all PV waste is considered non-hazardous.  The EU is the only large jurisdiction that has a PV End of life waste regulation that most notably mandates an extended producer obligation and also regulates the collection, recycling and financing of the waste management in the EU. It may be noted that the EU rules specifically exempt Chemical Content requirements for all PV modules.

It appears that in the case of India, while emulating EU regulations and standards, has not excluded PV from Chemical content requirements- thereby creating a restriction on the production of all solar modules in India.

Is this a drafting error or a conscious decision?  Till that gets sorted out, all Mon-perc and thin film modules have an existential problem to reckon with. Strict adherence to the E-waste regulations means that most domestic manufacturing capacity needs to shut shop and the technology in its existing state, cannot comply with the current E-waste regulations.  

I am sanguine, that cannot be the intention of the Regulation, and we can hopefully see amends.  The extended producer obligation framework will continue and should be welcomed by the solar eco-system as a long overdue way to protect our environment from the e-waste contained in end-of-life solar modules.

Vinay Kumar is the Chief Operating Officer, Vibrant Energy