How solar pv is made, step by step.

High-purity quartz and silica sand are extracted from deposits. Quartz feeds the silicon chain; silica sand also feeds glass production.

Primary and by-product silver mining. Silver is essential to solar cell metallization paste (~10% of global silver demand).

Soda ash (sodium carbonate) is mined (trona) or synthesized (Solvay process); a key flux in flat-glass manufacturing for solar cover glass.

Quartz is reduced with carbon in submerged arc furnaces to produce metallurgical-grade silicon (~98% purity).

• ›Carbon reductant (metallurgical coke / charcoal / coal) is a required input to the reduction, held at cutoff in V1 — recorded, not modeled as a node.

MG-Si is purified to solar-grade polysilicon (>99.9999%) via Siemens process or fluidized bed reactor.

• ›Silane / trichlorosilane (TCS) is a separable intermediate between MG-Si and polysilicon, held at cutoff in V1 — recorded as a candidate, not modeled as a node (only 1 silane actor in data).

Mined silver is refined into high-purity silver powder and flake — the separable intermediate that feeds metallization paste making. Refined silver demonstrably changes hands between distinct refiners and paste makers.

Refined silver is formulated into conductive pastes used to screen-print electrodes on solar cells. Critical bottleneck material.

High-purity quartz fused into crucibles used to grow monocrystalline silicon ingots. Consumable per ingot pull.

Polysilicon is melted and grown into monocrystalline or multicrystalline ingots, then sliced into thin wafers via diamond wire saws. Kept fused: every ingot grower in the data also cuts wafers, and no ingot-only seller appears, so the ingot boundary is proposed but not promoted under strict D10 (see candidates).

Low-iron, AR-coated patterned cover glass for the front of the module — melted from high-purity silica sand with soda-ash flux.

EVA and POE encapsulant sheets that laminate and insulate the cells between glass and backsheet.

• ›EVA / POE resin feedstock is a known upstream input, held at cutoff — recorded, not modeled as a node.

Polymer backsheets (Tedlar / PVDF / PET) that protect and electrically insulate the rear of the module.

Anodized aluminum frames that give the laminate mechanical rigidity and a mounting edge.

Junction boxes with bypass diodes and cable terminations; combiner and enclosure variants for module and string wiring.

Tinned-copper ribbon and interconnect wire that series-connect cells into strings.

• ›Copper (wire rod) is a known upstream input to ribbon, held at cutoff — recorded, not modeled as a node.

CdTe and CIGS absorber materials for thin-film modules. Held at cutoff: this is the upstream feed for the thin-film module variant; no distinct actor population is mapped in V1.

Wafers are doped, textured, passivated, and screen-printed into photovoltaic cells. PERC and TOPCon share the same input set and differ only in coefficient profile; HJT is a candidate fork (adds ITO/indium).

Cells are strung, laminated between glass and backsheet with encapsulant, framed, and fitted with a junction box. Forks into crystalline-silicon and thin-film sub-maps here.

Convert DC from the array into grid-quality AC. Strings, centrals, microinverters, hybrid solar+storage inverters, DC optimizers.

Single- or dual-axis trackers and fixed-tilt racking — the steel and aluminum structures mounting modules to the ground or roof.

Site preparation, mechanical mounting, and electrical interconnection that deliver installed capacity. Declared seed; its bulk material inputs (cement, cabling, fasteners) are held at cutoff and no distinct installer actor population is mapped in V1.

Medium-voltage step-up transformers that connect the plant to the grid. Plant-level balance-of-system; feeds installation.

Plant-level controls: power plant controllers (PPC), BMS/EMS, and SCADA that coordinate the array. Feeds installation.