The $14 is what ARMA claims in their press relesaes but they haven't broken down where they came at that number. Many analysts seem to think it could be much higher.
The net effect along with other regulatory moves the AB gov't has taken (they banned all renewables projects outright for some months a couple years ag) is to discourage investment in what was formerly a growing sector.
Can someone explain why this is wrong? There are plenty of other things that require paying a fee upfront for disposal. And solar panels are notoriously poisonous and don’t belong in landfills. This seems like a particularly… environmentally friendly step? Why is this being framed as something bad?
Also the "notoriously poisonous" part is just... not true.
There's bad faith outrage drifters and climate denialists who promote that idea, but the most common solar panel designs do not contain lead or cadmium.
And even the ones that do, solar panels are 100% recyclable. They shouldn't be going to landfill anyway, every single component in them except the glue that holds it together can be remanufactured into more solar panels.
My understanding is that it’s the thin film variant that’s “famously poisonous”, the Cadmium Telluride ones. But that’s not the type that almost any field full of solar is made up of.
Nobody is opposed to a recycling fee. If you actually read the article you will see it's 2.5x to 100x the recycling fees imposed anywhere else in the world. And accompanied by a disinformation campaign from the government.
Notably the same province has a massive abandoned oil & gas well problem that they have failed to deal with for decades at this point.
The same government also effectively banned the use of renewables to power datacentre projects in Alberta, forcing them to use natural gas only.
I stopped reading halfway because it sounded like pure propaganda to me without any justification as to why it was unreasonable.
$10 USD/panel sounds very reasonable to me, especially considering the recycling won’t occur for ~25 years. The fact it’s “more expensive” than other countries is not relevant since each country has their own structure and recycling fees aren’t an apples to apples comparison.
Adding $200USD to a $25k solar panel install so that recycling is taken care of doesn’t sound nearly as bad as what the article is declaring.
- Commissioned research estimates approximately C$5 per panel in present-value recycling costs, accounting for cost escalation over 20 years and potential reuse.
- The gov'ts "ARMA" has not published a breakdown explaining its C$14 figure.
- Utility projects already face reclamation security requirements covering recycling and disposal, raising a potential double-charging concern.
"I stopped reading halfway because it sounded like pure propaganda to me without any justification as to why it was unreasonable." Please stick to the HN rules. Please act in good faith
Alberta is the most US-like province. As it's not been hit by Trump tariffs, it opposes any change to the current situation. As it's based on oil revenue (with some food production), of course it opposes renewable energy sources. Bit selfish, it is.
I wonder how loud they'd yowl if "no trade with Canada" gores their ox?
Implicit in all the "we'll bring Canada to heel" and "we don't need anything from Canada" talk is an Alberta/Sask exception. They don't mean AB/SK. They mean the rest of Canada, which leans further to the left politically and has more of a manufacturing sector or agricultural / forestry focus.
Also notably there are US states like Texas which are also extremely focused on fossil fuel production which aren't taking this aggressive anti-renewables stance. Alberta is actually further on this axis than any other regime in North America -- taking on a very explicit anti-renewables stance. Even effectively (through regulation) banning their use in large scale datacentre rollouts.
The local elites there are extremely threatened by any renewable talk; they run an active disinformation talk, and formerly the province had one of the fastest growing renewable sectors in the world. (Alberta gets a lot of solar hours and has high winds, too)
Aside, I was coming back from Edmonton a couple days ago and in the airport there's a wine/liquor store with a sandwich board out front proudly proclaiming that they "have US wine & liquor for sale!" -- completely thumbing nose at the rest of the country as a business opportunity.
This is an insane take. A $14 recycling tax per $1000+ panel comes to <1.4%, which is around a quarter of federal sales tax for example, or 1/10 of combined GST and PST somewhere like BC.
Alberta has no provincial sales tax for the record and is the ONLY province without provincial sales tax. Solar panels are still more expensive in every other province in Canada based on sales tax rates alone.
<1.4% to fund the proper recycling of a solar panel seems more than reasonable.
Edit - also Alberta already has the lowest cost per installed watt of any province due to generally lower taxes and more vibrant construction ecosystem. Plus no PST. Complaining about a recycling fee is completely brain-dead and/or propaganda.
Entrenched interests want to take us all down with them, unfortunately. They will burn the field and salt the earth rather than yield control and lose their parasitical source of wealth.
In case you want to appropriately calibrate your anger.
Note that usually you mount many solar panels, not just one, so this will stack relatively quickly.
The net effect along with other regulatory moves the AB gov't has taken (they banned all renewables projects outright for some months a couple years ag) is to discourage investment in what was formerly a growing sector.
There's bad faith outrage drifters and climate denialists who promote that idea, but the most common solar panel designs do not contain lead or cadmium.
And even the ones that do, solar panels are 100% recyclable. They shouldn't be going to landfill anyway, every single component in them except the glue that holds it together can be remanufactured into more solar panels.
Notably the same province has a massive abandoned oil & gas well problem that they have failed to deal with for decades at this point.
The same government also effectively banned the use of renewables to power datacentre projects in Alberta, forcing them to use natural gas only.
$10 USD/panel sounds very reasonable to me, especially considering the recycling won’t occur for ~25 years. The fact it’s “more expensive” than other countries is not relevant since each country has their own structure and recycling fees aren’t an apples to apples comparison.
Adding $200USD to a $25k solar panel install so that recycling is taken care of doesn’t sound nearly as bad as what the article is declaring.
https://renewablesassociation.ca/recycling-a-tv-costs-2-75-w...
https://globalnews.ca/news/12048123/alberta-solar-panel-recy...
Notably:
- Commissioned research estimates approximately C$5 per panel in present-value recycling costs, accounting for cost escalation over 20 years and potential reuse.
- The gov'ts "ARMA" has not published a breakdown explaining its C$14 figure.
- Utility projects already face reclamation security requirements covering recycling and disposal, raising a potential double-charging concern.
I wonder how loud they'd yowl if "no trade with Canada" gores their ox?
Also notably there are US states like Texas which are also extremely focused on fossil fuel production which aren't taking this aggressive anti-renewables stance. Alberta is actually further on this axis than any other regime in North America -- taking on a very explicit anti-renewables stance. Even effectively (through regulation) banning their use in large scale datacentre rollouts.
The local elites there are extremely threatened by any renewable talk; they run an active disinformation talk, and formerly the province had one of the fastest growing renewable sectors in the world. (Alberta gets a lot of solar hours and has high winds, too)
Aside, I was coming back from Edmonton a couple days ago and in the airport there's a wine/liquor store with a sandwich board out front proudly proclaiming that they "have US wine & liquor for sale!" -- completely thumbing nose at the rest of the country as a business opportunity.
Alberta has no provincial sales tax for the record and is the ONLY province without provincial sales tax. Solar panels are still more expensive in every other province in Canada based on sales tax rates alone.
<1.4% to fund the proper recycling of a solar panel seems more than reasonable.
Edit - also Alberta already has the lowest cost per installed watt of any province due to generally lower taxes and more vibrant construction ecosystem. Plus no PST. Complaining about a recycling fee is completely brain-dead and/or propaganda.
https://solarpowerdepot.ca/canadian-solar-450w-mono-bifacial...
https://solarshoppingmall.com/products/renesola-450w-mono-so...
Those numbers point more towards 5-10% cost per panel.
I think your “$1,000+ panel” is conflating the hardware with its share of the entire installation. I don't know how else to explain it.
Also the "$14" number was put out by AMRA (the government's body) without any explanation of how they arrived at that number.
TFA is biased, yes, but its bias is frankly justifiable.