Revive or reuse: Environmental and energy insights into mesoporous perovskite solar cells recycling

With growing interest in perovskite solar cells, identifying the optimal recycling strategy becomes important. Strategies focusing on revival or layer-reuse were introduced. Yet their energy footprints and environmental impacts should be understood. Thus, revival – the highest level of recycling – and layer-reuse of carbon-based mesoporous perovskite solar cells were modelled alongside the revival of NiO- and Au-NiO-based cells. Subsequent analysis focused on energy return on energy investment combined with life cycle assessment investigating systems from cradle to end of second-life (second-life after recycling). The results showed that revival had higher return of energy (43) while having lower impacts (as low as 8 g CO₂-eq./kWh) compared to reuse of ZrO₂ electrode (as low as 8.8 g CO₂-eq./kWh). However, the degradation and lifetime of second-life devices might render layer-reuse more advantageous, highlighting the small nuances between different recycling levels. Additionally, the environmental impacts of nickel-based cells were significantly higher compared to carbon-based cells. Based on these findings future perovskite solar cell research could target effective revival or reuse.