Towards Sustainable Photovoltaic Waste Management in East China: Spatiotemporal Cost-Benefit Evaluation of Multi-Recycling Modes

As China confronts an unprecedented surge in decommissioned photovoltaic (PV) modules, establishing a robust and comprehensive recycling mode has become an urgent task. However, the existing literature lacks a systematic investigation into multi-stakeholder responsibility models for end-of-life PV management. To bridge this critical gap, firstly, this study conceptualized three multi-stakeholder PV recycling modes and developed an 11-parameter cost–benefit analysis model to dynamically evaluate their economic disparities under varying scenarios. Secondly, the framework is applied to a regional case involving 55 prefecture-level cities in the Shandong, Jiangsu, Anhui, and Zhejiang provinces in China. The results showed that the collaborative recycling mode involving retailers and third parties achieved optimal economic performance, incurring a lower cost (64.30 million CNY) than the alternative modes (70.41 and 80.25 million CNY, respectively). Cost structural analysis revealed that the collection, storage, transportation, and processing stages were the critical bottlenecks for cost control across all three modes. Scenario simulations further indicated a non-linear dynamic: while expanding the recovery scale enhanced profitability, excessive network optimization (beyond 20%) or prolonged storage durations yielded diminishing returns. Comprehensively, the maximum net benefit was achieved by synergizing scale expansion with moderate network optimization and a strict 30-day storage limit. Ultimately, these findings demonstrate the economic feasibility of multi-entity responsibility modes, providing a universal methodological framework for other regions and countries to construct efficient, low-cost PV recycling systems.