Most panels have a rated life of 25 years and deteriorate slowly. That provides plenty of time for the recycling to be built. It's also comparable to the design lifetime of most types of non-renewable power plant.
But my grandfather worked at a coal fired plant. I've been to the strip mine. I've seen the trains that run continuously to truck it in.
From a layman's perspective it seems like an incredibly efficient process. Is there any chemical refinement going on at all? All that I saw looked mechanical (but I was very young).
I would guess that it would take many years of Solar before it broke even, in an environmental impact sense, with "cleaner" coal.
I think ultimately solar probably wins. But the initial cost seems like it must be orders of magnitude higher.
That said, I'd get solar if I could. Just not my highest home-improvement priority and I'd have to do something about the trees shading the south side of my roof. I like my trees. :-(
OTOH it would be nice if there were a high power (~2KV), affordable (<$2,000?), silent wind turbine solution to supplement our grid power.
There are various estimates of the breakeven time, but even the most conservative ones put it under ten years.
You don't have to get your own solar if it's not convenient, that's what the grid is for.
1: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-r...
Since the GP was talking about "trees shading the south side of my roof" I'm guessing that he's in the northern hemisphere. Or maybe he's just really bad at siting solar panels, but I was giving him the benefit of the doubt. :)