Japanese → rt transcript

The government had been moving to make solar panel recycling mandatory, but

regarding institutional measures for proper disposal and recycling of solar panels, it decided to proceed with studies while considering a review of the draft system.

The Ministry of the Environment and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry had planned to submit a bill to this Diet session requiring solar panel manufacturers to recycle them, but they abandoned that plan.

given that the gap between landfill disposal costs and recycling costs for solar panels is currently large, and unlike other products such as cars and home appliances,

they concluded that, at this time, it would be difficult to provide a reasonable explanation for mandating recycling and making only solar panel manufacturers bear the cost difference.

One of the issues is who bears the recycling costs. Recycling for cars and home appliances is borne by the owner, so making only manufacturers bear the costs for solar panels is not reasonable

The Cabinet Legislation Bureau, which deliberates on new systems and bills, expressed that judgment.

The original plan had proceeded in the direction of making manufacturers bear recycling costs. However, solar panels have longer service lives than cars or home appliances, and in the case of overseas-made products,

there are cases where the manufacturer has gone bankrupt by the time they are discarded. Furthermore, the Cabinet Legislation Bureau noted that the difference between landfill disposal and recycling costs for solar panels is large, so

it judged that making recycling mandatory and forcing manufacturers to bear the price burden would be difficult.