PHOTORAMA - A Circular Economy Model for Photovoltaics

Research and innovation

Published on 04/28/2025

The PHOTORAMA project consortium inaugurated its pilot line at LuxChemtech GmbH in mid-April 2025. Launched in 2021, the project is nearing completion. Let’s put the spotlight on this outstanding technological and human adventure, which won an Innovation Award at EUSEW 2024.

PHOTORAMA, an EU-funded project coordinated by CEA, aims to create a circular model for the photovoltaic (PV) industry. It supports the development of advanced recycling technologies to recover critical and strategic materials from end-of-life solar modules.

Photovoltaic energy is currently the most widely installed source of electricity production worldwide. It is widely embraced as a solution to climate challenges due to its low cost, ease of deployment, and minimal risk or environmental impact.

In this context, the photovoltaic industry must set an example across the entire value chain. It needs to be resilient and sustainable, further improving its environmental footprint by moving toward a global circular economy approach.

Today, even if the industry complies with regulations and recycling obligations, current practices still result in the loss of valuable raw materials.

PHOTORAMA has been designed to rethink practices throughout the entire photovoltaic value chain.

There have been many achievements and successes!

The recycling steps have been revisited using innovative processes, which were scaled up and demonstrated on a dedicated pilot line designed to handle and recover every component of photovoltaic modules. Since April 2025, this pilot line has been visited by around a hundred industry professionals.

In a collaborative spirit, the consortium tackled technical challenges and obstacles. Together, we shaped a unique and flexible model to manage a wide variety of end-of-life photovoltaic modules. A collective success. Researchers, equipment makers, and recyclers/end-users jointly developed several technologies and brought them from the lab to industrial pilots across Europe.
says Claire AGRAFFEIL (CEA), coordinator of the PHOTORAMA project.

The team is also helping to shape future regulations by contributing to the revision of the DEEE French Directive (Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment) and supporting the development of the recyclability index, among other initiatives.

A Major Impact for the Industry and the Environment

By developing a circular model to reuse glass, aluminum, copper, silver, indium, and silicon from end-of-life solar modules, the technologies developed within the PHOTORAMA project bring high-impact environmental innovation. Moreover, the ability to recycle these materials reduces our dependence on external supply sources. Recycling 1,200 tonnes of photovoltaic modules could save more than 3,800 tonnes of CO₂-equivalent emissions, according to preliminary estimates. This is particularly significant when you consider that millions of tonnes of photovoltaic waste are expected to require processing in the coming decades.

The technology developed by CEA as part of the PHOTORAMA project is the delamination of photovoltaic panels using diamond wire cutting.

This project is also linked to the Institute of Technology INES.2S within the framework of France 2030.

More information:

Visit to PHOTORAMA’s pilot line at LuxChemtech GmbH

Opening of the PHOTORAMA pilot line at LuxChemtech GmbH

EUSEW 2024: project managed by HaDEA wins Innovation award

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 958223.

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