Research theme 2
Treating Waste Gas and Liquid from Recycling
Theme leaders
Prof Rose Amal
(UNSW)
Prof Gregory Leslie
(UNSW)
Background
Recycling processes for solar panels can generate significant volumes of waste gases and liquids that, if untreated, pose environmental and health risks. Conventional treatment methods are often limited to containment or disposal, missing opportunities for resource recovery. To address this, RT2 develops technologies that not only neutralise harmful by-products but also convert them into valuable materials, ensuring that PV recycling is safe, sustainable, and fully circular.
Aims
Cleaner Off-Gas Treatment
Develop advanced technologies to capture and convert off-gases into useful chemicals and materials rather than releasing them as pollutants.
Smarter Waste Liquid Treatment
Design processes to treat waste liquids from recycling and transform them into value-added products for industrial reuse.
Outcomes
This theme will establish innovative methods for turning harmful waste streams into resources, reducing emissions and effluents from PV recycling. Outcomes include cleaner air through advanced off-gas treatment and sustainable water management through waste liquid valorisation. By closing these loops, RT2 enhances the environmental performance of recycling plants and contributes to a circular economy approach where all outputs—solid, liquid, and gas—are repurposed as valuable inputs for other industries.
RT 2.1. Cleaner Off-Gas Treatment
P14: Developing technologies to treat off-gases and convert them into useful materials instead of pollutants.
Remarks from preliminary work
Ajorloo, M., Ghodrat, M., Scott, J., Strezov, V., Zhuo, Y. & Shen, Y. (2024) shapes the RT 2.1 off-gas treatment and valorisation components by selecting thermochemical co-processing and catalytic gas upgrading as key tasks to convert polymer decomposition off-gases into value-added synthesis gas rather than flaring or scrubbing them as waste.
RT 2.2. Smarter Waste Liquid Treatment
P15: Treating waste liquids from recycling and transforming them into value-added products.
Remarks from preliminary work
Song, S., Li, Q., Leslie, G. & Shen, Y. (2024a) defines the RT 2.2 waste liquid treatment components, justifying the selection of selective heavy-metal removal, acid recovery, and membrane-based water recycling tasks to achieve zero-liquid-discharge and closed-loop reagent regeneration.