A method for efficient decomposition of EVA in crushed solar panels

The paper first analyzes the physical crushing mechanism of photovoltaic modules and then examines the separation effect of EVA using pyrolysis crushing. With the increase in the number of crushing cycles, the weight proportion of particle size increased by 19.5%, and the weight proportion of -0.10mm cumulative product increased by 4.8%. The weight loss rate of the -0.10mm particle size of the heated cells was the highest. Further SEM analysis of the pyrolyzed crushed materials clearly showed that, compared to the state before pyrolysis, the materials changed from block aggregates to smaller, uniformly distributed particles, without adhesive residues. The pyrolyzed crushed materials had a higher degree of particle stereoscopic structure and lower density compared to the materials before pyrolysis. EDS analysis indicated that the main elemental composition of the crushed materials changed minimally before and after heating, but the elemental distribution in the pyrolyzed materials was more uniform than before pyrolysis. This further validated that incorporating pyrolysis into the crushing process significantly enhances the separation efficiency of EVA.