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Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

reuters.com

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Re: Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

#181

Post by stjohnswarts »

nacs wrote: post #175
umvi wrote: post #46

Russia's actions make me nervous that China will be emboldened to do the same for Taiwan

I wonder if they'll also call the invasion a "peace keeping operation".

Now you're thinkin! It's strange that this would fool anyone. The US has been transparent and accurate with stories, and it doesn't seem that USS... er Russia is firewalling off the internet just yet. Although I think that is soon to follow so that western stories will be limited except to those who tunnel through. I had hope Putin was just doing some dick swinging before April elections but it looks like I'm 100% wrong. it's not like he was going to lose anyway or that he's anything other than a dictator.

Re: Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

#182

Post by [deleted] »

bastardoperator wrote: post #141
deltaonefour wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ironically, I think the above statement is irrational. Why does being a dictator automatically make you more irrational? Absolute power has no direct causal bearing on human intelligence. It does not make you more irrational or more rational. There are plenty of examples of good kings, bad kings, good emperors and bad emperors throughout history both for ancient china and plenty of other civilizations. Modern China,…

History is pretty clear, go check it out. Nobody wants to be ruled by a single individual that operates with impunity.

[deleted]

Re: Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

#184

Post by stjohnswarts »

atlantas wrote: post #159
jthrowsitaway wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I wonder if China has the same amount of waste and overspending in their military industrial complex.

That's highly relevant! China may spend 1/3, but they are more efficient. We probably waste 1/2 or more of our spending. So it's possible we are closer to parity than it would appear if solely comparing budget.

They aren't more efficient. However, their costs (especially for labor) are much lower than in the USA except for stuff they can't source from government owned sources.

Re: Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

#185

Post by MisterTea »

whatshisface wrote: post #110
MisterTea wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is exactly why this is a non-issue. It's not like the air over the Ukraine is magically richer in neon.

It's not a non-issue. You can't extract it from air with tweezers, you need to build a lot of equipment. It takes a long time to build a chemical plant, and if Intel is sitting idle until that plant is built... well, that's an enormous problem.

> you need to build a lot of equipment.

Cryogenic distillation of air is a solved problem. There are plenty of plants already in operation all over the globe meaning there only needs to be modification to existing plants to further collect and crack the remaining 0.1% of air. I'm sure this is not hard to do with existing cryoplants.

If we already have the capacity then why are we without Neon production is a good question. Neon isn't in high demand like the easily extracted major components of air: nitrogen (78%), oxygen (21%), and argon (0.9%). Neon is something like 18ppm in air so a lot of energy has to go in to get very little out. So my guess is economics where the existing Ukrainian cryogenic plants have kept their prices low enough to discourage adding this capacity to new/existing plants elsewhere (maybe they get cheap energy, subsidies, etc). Now it might be profitable.

Re: Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

#186

Post by stjohnswarts »

darkhorn wrote: post #166

Some Russian products that you would like to avoid: * Yandex * Lukoil * WinRAR * Kaspersky * Lada * Russian Standard Original Vodka * Stoli Vodka * Baltika * Lukoil * Gazprom * Kamaz * Masha and the Bear * Kalashnikov * Stolichnaya * Ural motorcycles * VK

Yandex was the only one for me. I blocked it on all the hosts files under my control and my pihole network dns

Re: Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

#188

Post by belorn »

tempnow987 wrote: post #4
perihelions wrote: post #2

How is neon extracted and why does one country have a 90% monopoly (in this specific grade)? edit: Found this C&EN story from 2016 that adds context: - "Chip makers, which account for more than 90% of global neon consumption, are already experiencing high prices and some shortages stemming from the Russian conflict with Ukraine, Shon-Roy says. The war, which started in 2014, interrupted global supplies of the gas, ab…

I think it might be tied to steelmaking? Ie, if you are already doing work to generate oxy and nitrogen, getting a byproduct like neon is easier? So CAN the USA separate air? For sure. Maybe it's just cheaper. A lot of these stories about disruptions are disruptions of the CHEAP option.

It not really a byproduct per say of oxygen and nitrogen, but the byproduct of that process has a higher amount of neon than air by about 99 times. Still, the gas that we got is about 93% argon, and then you got to remove the carbon dioxide, but then its mostly neon left I think.

Re: Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

#189

Post by partiallypro »

Guthur wrote: post #160

This is not the reason. Pure and simply Russia needs people, its dying. Low birth rate, high death rate, little immigration to make up the short fall (who wants to move to Russia :)), and to top off a weak economy that will struggle to support a small less active workforce. Interestingly Ukraine has pretty much the same population problem. This will be increasingly common problem for countries as population growth sl…

The entire Western world is declining birth rates. It's very worrying. People complained about over population, but a nose dive in birth rates can become near irreversable.

Re: Ukraine is a major producer of neon gas, critical for lasers used in chipmaking

#190

Post by amelius »

scyzoryk_xyz wrote: post #173
amelius wrote: post #138

EU and US response to Russia is totally ineffective. They should have moved troops in from the beginning.

And risked an enormous escalation with a nuclear power? That would be reckless. Don't get me wrong - I would also like to see decisive action to this attack. But escalating a relatively local dispute into a conflict between world powers would risk a WW. Moving in troops into a non-NATO ally would also be extremely difficult to explain on the world stage. There probably is decisive action being implemented behind the…

Putin is very rational and predictive. The nuclear option is not relevant.

He moved troops to the borders, waited for a response. And this response was what he expected to be: just sanctions. This gave him the "ok" to invade.

Sending troops would be a clear signal. Costly, but you can also see it as a good exercise.

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