The EMPOWER project will develop alternative equipment and processes to advance PV manufacturing, tackling the bottlenecks across the entire value chain-from Si wafer production to PV module fabrication-. Our goal is to reduce Capital Expenditure (CapEx) and Operating Expenditure (OpEx), leading to a lower Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) in Europe. We aim to enhance throughput, yield, sustainability, and decrease energy and raw material consumption. We will demonstrate the high-quality N-type Si wafers production using direct wafering tools, bypassing the traditional PolySi, ingot, and sawing process, contributing to cost reduction, minimizing waste production CO2 footprint. This innovative wafering technology will revolutionize the traditional wafer process, revitalizing Europe's PV upstream industry. Simultaneously, we will demonstrate alternative metallization processes for solar cells to reduce silver (Ag) consumption, high-throughput edge passivation to mitigate power loss during cell cutting, and high-speed interconnection and lamination to meet flexibility requirements in diverse cell and module configurations. The emphasis is on advancing N-type Si-based high-efficiency solar cell technologies, prioritizing low carbon footprint production, with an opportunity to compete with the Chinese PV industry. Leveraging Industry 4.0 implementation, EMPOWER aims to enhance production efficiency, improve PV production quality, and further reduce production costs. The project includes a demonstration of a virtual vertically integrated PV production line, along with the development of business cases and market introduction strategies. Through close collaboration in a multidisciplinary and multiactor approach including a solid exploitation and business development strategy, EMPOWER will not only achieve low-cost European PV manufacturing, but also bring Europe back to the leadership in the PV sector.

EcoSolar envisions an integrated value chain to manufacture and implement solar panels in the most ecologic way by maximising resource efficiency, taking into account reuse of materials during production and repurposing solar panel components at end of life stage. EcoSolar will demonstrate that during the lifetime of a solar electricity producing field, individual panels can be monitored, allowing to identify defaulting panels at an early stage, replacing or repairing them and thus to increase the overall energy yield. In WP1, SINTEF&Norsun will work on recovery & reuse during silicon ingot crystallisation, addressing recovery of argon purge gas and work with Steuler on reusable crucibles. In WP2 Garbo will recover Si-kerf-loss during wafering, and with SINTEF work on potential reuse applications, like as Si-feedstock in crystallisation processes, or as resource in crucible manufacturing or lithium ion battery production. In WP3, ISC&SoliTek will look into potential for re-using process water; reducing material resources, like chemicals and silver, by smarter solar cell design, more efficient processes and recovery and reuse of chemicals; AIMEN will develop solar cell monitoring and repair for inline processing in an industrial plant, to enable remanufacturing. In WP4 Apollon will use a module design that results in reduced bill of materials, enables remanufacturing and reuse of components from modules that showed failures after assembly or have been identified as malfunctioning in operating PV installations, based on integrated diagnosis techniques for the detection of failure modes. bifa will collect data from all previous WPs to assess environmental impact of the intended innovations (WP5). Bifa will identify waste streams that are costly and hard to recycle and find opportunities to repurpose those waste products. BCC will disseminate the results and will support the partners with the exploitation and replication potential of the results (WP6).