Separation of Valuable Metal from Waste Photovoltaic Ribbon through Extraction and Precipitation#

Abstract

With rapid increasing production and installation, recycling of photovoltaic modules has become the main issue. According to the research, the accumulation of waste modules will reach to 8600 tons in 2030. Moreover, Crystalline-silicon (c-Si) Photovoltaic modules account for more than 90% of the waste. C-Si PV modules contain 1.3% of weight of photovoltaic ribbon inside which contains the most of lead, tin and copper in the PV modules, which would cause environmental and humility problem. This study provided a valuable metal separation process for PV ribbons. Ribbons content 82.1% of Cu, 8.9% of Sn, 5.2% of Pb, and 3.1% of Ag. All of them were leached by 3M of hydrochloric acid in the optimal condition. Ag was halogenated to AgCl and precipitated. Cu ion was extracted and separated from Pb and Sn by Lix984N then stripped by 3M H2SO4. The effect of the optimal parameters of extraction was also studied in this essay. The maximum extraction efficiency of Cu ion was 99.64%. The separation condition of Pb and Sn were obtained by adjusting the pH value to 4 thought ammonia to precipitate and separate Pb and Sn. The recovery of Pb and Sn can reach 99%.