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Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

reuters.com

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Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#91

Post by adventured »

jhgb wrote: post #57
wibagusto wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2-4 million gallons per day is a lot of water to piss away for some chips that go out of fashion in 5 years.

Pretty much any facility capable of manufacturing semiconductor components has been very busy for the past few years -- Intel even had to resurrect 22nm chips at some time. Why do you assume that this will "go out of fashion in 5 years"? Historically this seems extremely unlikely. If anything, tens of millions of people going out of poverty every year are going to be consuming even more chips.

And every year 80+ million people come of age such that they become electronics consumers, buying smartphones, laptops and so on. A billion new electronics consumers every ~12 years. The world is going to need a lot more chip manufacturing capacity over the next few decades.

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#92

Post by brianbreslin »

kiklion wrote: post #55
buryat wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I decided to check how much water a plant would use a plant used 4 million gallons of water a day (according to https://www.theverge.com/22628925/water-semiconductor-shorta... ) which is about 126000 metric tons a day arizona used 7 million acre-foot of water in 2017 ( https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona-environme... ) which is about 19000 acre-feet a day == 23014434 metric ton a day (using http://www.…

What is ‘using water’ in this context? Is it boiled off? Contaminated and needs to be cleaned?

In chip making they remove all the impurities making it PURE h20, which is in fact too pure to be just dumped back in the ground, needs to be re-mineralized before it can be dumped.

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#93

Post by CivBase »

seanw444 wrote: post #66
mcphage wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do we really need to produce more IC's ? In this case, it's not so much about more ICs (although we do need more right now), but it's who's making the ICs . The US is trying to ramp up their internal production capability, rather than depending on Taiwan as heavily.

And then when (if*) we become independent, and China finally gets the balls to scoop up Taiwan, our administration will be nowhere to be found.

As romantic as the US gallantly defending Taiwan from the Chinese invaders sounds, let's be honest. The US could do little more than buy the Taiwanese some time to escape.

If the CCP ever decides it's time to take control of Taiwan by force, they could. It's the economic backlash from the rest of the world they are currently worried about, not military resistance. Although I'm not sure just how much they even have to be worried about economically considering how the world has handled recent CCP atrocities.

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#94

Post by 1234letshaveatw »

NortySpock wrote: post #64
kd913 wrote: post #5

Doesn't chip making a lot of water, most of it in Arizona is fed by Lake Mead? The same reservoir that is at 30% capacity, with acute water shortages and with 4 years of increased precipitation necessary for an adequate refill. We are adding a chip making facility which needs a lot of water here? This sounds like a recipe for disaster whenever there is a period of water stress which appears to be occurring in that re…

https://youtu.be/Dq04GpzRZ0g?t=472 Asianometry did a breakdown on water usage of chip fabs in Taiwan and Arizona, including noting Arizona's state-wide water management plan, and pointing out that land-use wise, a chip plant makes more money per acre (gross revenue, and in property taxes) than other commercial or industrial or farming zones. A gallon of water makes more money in a chip plant than in an almond tree. (…

Wouldn't it make just as much money in a spot with no water usage concerns?

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#95

Post by thehappypm »

ethanbond wrote: post #38
thehappypm wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arizona is famously good at water management. They require a 100 year plan and are basically completely non-dependent on the ever-shrinking Colorado River. If any state would have a plan for recycling and make sure this plan is done appropriately it’s AZ.

… what? The US southwest is entering its first ever Tier 1 water shortage next year, meaning Arizona will have reduced supply equivalent to 1.2MM people’s annual consumption. No reason to believe we don’t go straight from here to Tier 2, onto Tier 3, and so on. Nature doesn’t provide enough water in a desert to be running sprawling metropolises and even more massive farms and graze land - especially water-intensive c…

Contrary to common belief, cities do not really need gigantic amounts of water. You take a shower, water goes down the drain, you can reclaim most of it if you want to. Don't allow irrigated lawns, reclaim gray water, urban water needs drop to a trickle. AZ is a leader in this space.

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#96

Post by Nbox9 »

kspacewalk2 wrote: post #87
Buttons840 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So one business / structure will use 1/200th of all water? That does sound like a lot.

Definitely sounds like a lot. Perhaps conservation efforts are in order, to reduce water waste by ~1% to allow for this strategically important, high value added industry to develop further. Thankfully, water waste is so rife in Arizona that it shouldn't be all that difficult to do so.

Maybe, if there are important reasons why this factory should be in a desert state. I think everyone agrees that chips are vitally important now, but chip shortages aren’t nearly as bad as a water shortage is.

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#97

Post by runako »

ovi256 wrote: post #52
kd913 wrote: post #5

Doesn't chip making a lot of water, most of it in Arizona is fed by Lake Mead? The same reservoir that is at 30% capacity, with acute water shortages and with 4 years of increased precipitation necessary for an adequate refill. We are adding a chip making facility which needs a lot of water here? This sounds like a recipe for disaster whenever there is a period of water stress which appears to be occurring in that re…

> Seems to more closely follow tax breaks and tax income It follows feasibility, AFAIK. All new manufacturing is in Southern US states because they're the ones that allow new plants to be built. The others tie projects down in long, expensive, non-successful environmental studies. At this point, it's easier to bring water to the desert (Arizona) than get approval for a manufacturing facility in a non-desert.

> All new manufacturing is in Southern US states because they're the ones that allow new plants to be built.

New manufacturing is built in the South because that's where wages are low, worker protections are weaker, and there is less union activity. Companies will essentially tell you this in their PR about opening new plants.

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#98

Post by 1234letshaveatw »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #74
ovi256 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Seems to more closely follow tax breaks and tax income It follows feasibility, AFAIK. All new manufacturing is in Southern US states because they're the ones that allow new plants to be built. The others tie projects down in long, expensive, non-successful environmental studies. At this point, it's easier to bring water to the desert (Arizona) than get approval for a manufacturing facility in a non-desert.

Intel has built fabs in Arizona for a long time, this isn’t a new thing. They do this because of seismic stability and a lack of severe weather. Water isn’t a huge concern because they can internally recycle most of it.

vs. somewhere like Ohio? It is hard to believe moderate snowfall would override environmental externalities such as cooling costs and water use.

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#99

Post by LgWoodenBadger »

brianbreslin wrote: post #92
kiklion wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is ‘using water’ in this context? Is it boiled off? Contaminated and needs to be cleaned?

In chip making they remove all the impurities making it PURE h20, which is in fact too pure to be just dumped back in the ground, needs to be re-mineralized before it can be dumped.

If that's all that it needs, why would they not recycle it back into the water supply?

Re: Intel breaks ground on $20B Arizona plants as U.S. chip factory race heats up

#100

Post by PragmaticPulp »

baron_harkonnen wrote: post #75
Buttons840 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So one business / structure will use 1/200th of all water? That does sound like a lot.

Not to mention that industry itself only accounts for 6% of Arizona's water usage [0] so we're talking about one single structure increasing the industrial usage by ~10%. [0]

Industry is a surprisingly small portion of water consumption in many places. In many states, household water use (including lawns) can handily exceed the water used by industry.

Using this water for domestic chip making is arguably a very reasonable use of water. If we’re going to start cutting water usage, let’s start with things like golf courses in the desert instead of critical chip-making infrastructure.

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