Spanish solar industry association bridging EU research with solar businesses; active in PV recycling and renewable energy storage projects.
SOLARTYS is the Spanish industry association representing solar energy companies, with a mandate to drive internationalization and innovation across the sector. Rather than conducting research in-house, they contribute their industry network, sector expertise, and dissemination capacity to European research consortia — making them a bridge between laboratory outputs and commercial solar markets. In H2020, they participated in projects addressing two pressing challenges for the solar industry: recovering valuable materials from end-of-life photovoltaic modules, and integrating copper-based flow batteries into renewable energy grids. Their core value to any consortium is access to Spanish and European solar businesses that can absorb, demonstrate, or commercialize research results.
ELSi (2016-2018) focused on industrial-scale recovery of silicon, aluminum, silver, gold, and copper from spent photovoltaic modules, directly aligned with SOLARTYS's solar industry membership.
As an industry association in both ELSi and CUBER, SOLARTYS brings its member network to connect research outcomes with solar businesses capable of adoption.
Both projects share a circular economy thread — ELSi through PV recycling and material reuse, CUBER through copper-based battery systems designed for renewables integration.
CUBER (2020-2024) on copper-based redox flow batteries marks SOLARTYS's move beyond photovoltaics into broader energy storage and electric grid applications.
In their early H2020 participation (2016-2018), SOLARTYS was focused squarely on the end-of-life challenge for silicon photovoltaic panels — recovering metals like silver, copper, aluminum, and gold through electrically driven separation processes. By 2020, their focus had shifted toward energy storage and grid integration, joining a project on copper-based redox flow batteries for renewables, with circular economy framing as a connecting thread. The trajectory suggests SOLARTYS is following the solar sector's own evolution: from managing the legacy of first-generation PV installations toward enabling the storage and grid flexibility that next-generation solar deployment requires.
SOLARTYS is moving from end-of-life solar hardware management toward energy storage and grid integration — making them a relevant dissemination partner for any project targeting the Spanish or European solar industry's transition to flexible, storage-backed renewables.
SOLARTYS has never held a coordinator role in H2020 — they join consortia as a participant, contributing industry access and dissemination reach rather than leading technical work packages. With 15 unique partners across 9 countries spread over just two projects, they operate in medium-to-large consortia where their value is connecting research outputs to solar industry players. This pattern is typical for industry associations: they are recruited by research-heavy partners who need a credible industry channel into a national market.
SOLARTYS has built connections with 15 distinct consortium partners across 9 countries through only two projects — a broad footprint for such a compact portfolio, reflecting the large multi-partner nature of the RIA and IA projects they joined. Their network spans European research institutions, technology companies, and industry actors in the energy sector.
SOLARTYS occupies a specific and hard-to-replicate niche: they are the designated voice of the Spanish solar business community in EU research consortia. For any project that needs to validate technology with solar industry actors, recruit pilot users from the Spanish market, or ensure commercial uptake of results in Southern Europe, SOLARTYS provides a ready-made industry channel that individual research institutes cannot replicate. Their combination of solar sector focus and internationalization mandate also makes them useful for projects seeking to expand beyond national markets into the broader European solar supply chain.
