A game theoretic incentive model for closed-loop solar cell supply chain by considering government role

Nowadays, to avoid further damage to the environment and supply the raw materials from the used solar cells, some countries are trying to recycle the used solar systems. In this paper, we develop a three-echelon closed-loop solar cell supply chain (CLSCSC) including a supplier, a third-party logistics (3PL), and an assembler considering two kinds of solar cells, dye-sensitized and perovskite. The return amount of used solar systems depends on the environmental awareness level of customers, the third-party logistics' effort for collection, the return price of used solar systems, and the efficiency of solar cells. This problem is modeled by a Stackelberg game, where the 3PL is a follower and the supplier and the assembler are the chain leaders. Moreover, the government incentive schemes in CLSCSC by assigning the subsidy for technology R&D and manufacturing costs for supplier and dedicating the subsidy for collection cost to encourage the 3PL to collect more used solar systems are also analyzed. The government's subsidy makes an effort to return more solar cells in the chain. According to the results, the efficiency of the new solar cell (dye-sensitized and perovskite) under government intervention is almost two times more than the new solar cell's efficiency without government intervention. Besides, the collection effort under government intervention is 2% more than the collection effort without government intervention. Finally, managerial insights are considered for the proposed model.