This is not news but a useful reminder nonetheless.

Advances in efficiency may cause replacing them to be viable. Still.

I wish we could still install the old panels somewhere. They might not be good enough to be rooftop solar anymore, but in the field, why not take all they can still give?

Because solar panels are dirt cheap to produce and your time and construction materials and land has value. Recognizing trash is vital for an eco friendly economy.

But that relies on the capitalist assumption that producing trash and CO2 is free because you can dump it withouth having to pay for it, and destroying nature to stripmine for the raw resources only costs the purchasing price because the environment isn’t monetized.

Plus the imperialist assertion that providing decentralized electricity to poor people in developing nations is net negative because it increases the cost of labor from those regions because they can do other productive things than work in your factory.

No. It relies on the assumption that newer panels produce more energy hence are more eco friendly.

Depends on how you define eco friendly.

The old panels already exist so if you can use them without having to transport them across the world (like the parent comment suggests), continuing to use them is eco-friendlier than producing new ones, which requires additional CO2 from manufacturing

Not doing anything at all has the lowest emissions. But it is obviously not the best way to curb impact while preserving lives and quality of life.

Your adversity to investments that do pay off would be a great hinderance to society as a whole.

Solar panels can be recycled, take very little materials and manufacturing and are usually not the limiting factor when it comes to transitioning into a low damage economy.

Throwing away great amounts of cheap solar power because you would have to lift a finger to achieve it is not… Great.