Circular economy strategies as enablers for solar PV adoption in organizational market segments

While the uptake of solar energy has been a success in recent years, PV panels will cause an increasing waste problem in the coming decades. At the same time, it is important to further stimulate investments in solar energy solutions to reach climate ambitions and the Sustainable Development Goals. In this paper, we investigate when circular economy strategies and business models can enable solar energy investments while mitigating its waste problem. We use focus group data from Flanders (Belgium) to address the demand side of different market seg-ments outside the dominant residential market of homeowners. These markets have in common that they are governed or mediated by organizations and contain business-to-business and business-to-government features. Our results show that organizational solar PV investments are mainly driven by lower energy costs, indepen-dence, and secured access to energy, and that the uptake of circular solar solutions mainly depends on a viable business case. In most cases, a lack of market development and organizational boundary conditions limit the en-abling potential of circular solar options. Given the current energy crisis and challenges stemming from the elec-trification of mobility, we recommend policy makers to invest in regulatory frameworks that support the implementation of innovative data technologies that enable both improved circularity outcomes and lower op-erational expenditures. (c) 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of Institution of Chemical Engineers. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Automated summary

This paper investigates the application of circular economy strategies in mitigating the waste problem of solar energy investments. The demand side of various market segments outside the residential market is explored using focus group data from Flanders, Belgium. The results reveal that organizational solar PV investments are mainly driven by factors like lower energy costs, independence, and secured access to energy, while the adoption of circular solar solutions depends on viable business cases and market development.