From Cradle to Kilowatt: Environmental Sustainability of Modern Photovoltaic Systems

Abstract Photovoltaic (PV) systems play a central role in energy transition strategies; however, a comprehensive evaluation of their environmental performance requires a life cycle perspective. This study presents a cradle-to-grave Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of a high-efficiency modern photovoltaic system comprising a solar module, an inverter, and a steel support canopy. The analysis was conducted in accordance with ISO 14040-44, using SimaPro software v9.6 and Ecoinvent database v3.10. The Functional Unit was defined as 1 kWh of electricity generated by the PV system. The results showed that electricity generated by the analysed PV system leads to reductions approximately 92% in climate change emissions (from 0.39 to 0.03 kg CO 2 eq/kWh) and approximately 95% in fossil resource depletion (from 5.87 to 0.30 MJ/kWh) when compared with the Italian electricity grid mix. The production stage, particularly raw material extraction and manufacturing, dominated the environmental profile, whereas End-of-Life (EoL) management provides significant additional benefits. The inclusion of recycling and recovery pathways under phase D reduced climate change impacts by approximately 26% through avoided burdens. The novelty of this work lies in the integrated system-level approach, which explicitly includes auxiliary components such as the steel canopy and consistently normalises all material flows to lifetime electricity production, as well as in the explicit quantification of EoL benefits under a cut-off allocation framework. Overall, the findings confirm the strong environmental performance of modern photovoltaic systems and support their contribution to circular economy strategies and sustainable energy transitions.