Polaris Solar Photovoltaic Network recently published an in-depth article titled “State-Backed Players Enter the Market: A New PV Market Is Here!”, systematically outlining the full landscape of end-of-life photovoltaic module recycling in China, from mandatory policy requirements and parallel deployment by state-owned and private enterprises to large-scale commercial operations. Among the “professional recycling enterprises,” RESOLAR was specifically named. As “China’s first PV recycling company to receive venture capital investment” and “one of the few companies with full industrial-chain capabilities,” it has become a typical example of a private enterprise establishing a commercial closed loop for PV recycling.

Based on a 25-year design life, China’s first batch of large-scale photovoltaic modules installed after 2000 is entering its retirement period. The industry estimates that the country’s cumulative retired capacity had reached 10GW by 2025, will reach 30GW by 2030, and surge to 148GW by 2035, corresponding to a trillion-yuan disposal market. The Code of Ecological and Environmental Protection of the People’s Republic of China, which took effect on August 15, 2026, incorporated a “responsibility system for the treatment of retired photovoltaic equipment” for the first time. During the same period, the Guiding Opinions on Promoting the Comprehensive Utilization of Photovoltaic Modules, issued by six ministries and commissions including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, set targets of cumulatively comprehensively utilizing 250,000 tons by 2027 and having the capacity to address large-scale retirement by 2030. Polaris statistics show that more than 45 national-level policies involving module recycling have been introduced since 2017, marking the industry’s formal entry into the “mandatory era.”

Faced with the trillion-yuan blue-ocean market for photovoltaic module recycling, the industry landscape is taking shape around three groups: “state-backed players, module manufacturers, and professional enterprises.” Key companies and their deployments are as follows:

• State-backed players: China Resources Recycling Group (intensively rolling out production lines/bases), State Power Investment Corporation Huanghe Company (China’s first pilot line for recycling all materials), Shouchu Wanqiantong under China Orient Asset Management (combined investment of over RMB 18 billion in two projects in Xinjiang and Ningxia), CECEP Solar Energy (a 10,000-ton-level intelligent demonstration line), and Guoneng Kehua Longyuan Environmental Protection/China Energy Investment Corporation Longyuan Environmental Protection (production lines ranging from thousand-ton to 10,000-ton scale).

• Module manufacturers: JinkoSolar (demonstration line using a pyrolysis-chemical method), Yingli Energy (physical-method production line with an annual processing capacity of 4,400 tons), DAS Solar (purely physical method), and Trina Solar (which jointly produced the world’s first fully recycled and regenerated module in 2024 with Jinghuan Jiayuan and other companies).

• Professional enterprises: Ruicai Environmental Protection, Yong’an Guangxun, RESOLAR (China’s first PV recycling company to receive venture capital investment and one of the few companies with full industrial-chain capabilities), Sino-Platinum Metals, and Qinghai Huachao.