Do 10 per cent of solar panels arrive already broken? Industry insiders say such a loss rate would break the solar industry, but an anecdote that a tenth of the panels do arrive damaged at large scale solar projects is proving to be very persistent.
This week, Tindo Solar chief Richard Petterson repeated a version of this to a parliamentary hearing on solar panel reuse and recycling.
“Anecdotal evidence would suggest that when some companies do test panels before they go in, something like 10 per cent are rejected,” he told a House of Representatives committee, a single line in a broader discussion about finding ways to make panels last longer.
Renew Economy has seen different versions of this anecdote pop up on social media in anti-renewable energy groups, and has traced it back as far as Muswellbrook in January 2025.
That was when shire council mayor Jeff Drayton told the Independent Planning Commission in New South Wales that unnamed “industry experts” warned council staff some 10 per cent of the panels arriving for the 135 megawatt (MW) Muswellbrook solar project “will be defective, damaged in transit, or damaged during construction.”
