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Sudden power outage at TSMC factory!Or lose 200 million yuan, and 30,000 wafers are damaged

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Chips (public number: aichip001)

Compilation | Gao Ge

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Xindongxi reported on April 15 that according to Taiwan media reports, yesterday morning, TSMC Nanke’s Fab14 P7 plant suddenly went out of power. The industry estimated that 30,000 wafers were affected, and the loss amount was less than NT$1 billion (equivalent to RMB 230 million). .

The plant mainly produces electronic chips for automobiles, and this accident is undoubtedly worse for the chip shortage problem that needs to be solved in the near future.

TSMC responded that the reason for the power outage was the abnormal cable of the Nanke UHV substation. At present, the personnel in the plant are safe and sound. The diesel generators have been used to restore power and the company has cooperated with Taipower to restore normal power supply.

  1. Sudden power failure caused 30,000 wafers, and the loss could reach NT$1 billion

According to Taiwan media reports, around 11:06 in the morning, the 161kV underground of the electricity supplier Taipower was accidentally damaged due to the construction of the new plant by Sanfu Gas adjacent to the Nanke plant. The cable caused the Nanke-Sanfu line to trip, causing a power outage.

Nanke’s Fab14 P7 plant mainly produces 12-inch wafers and is one of TSMC’s important bases for 40nm and 45nm process production.

▲ TSMC Fab14 P7 plant (Source: Google Maps)

Nanke practitioners pointed out that TSMC’s Fab14 plant was affected by today’s power outage. About 30,000 wafers will be affected, and the estimated loss will be less than NT$1 billion.

As for whether all will be scrapped, TSMC needs to wait for further evaluation. The number of scrapped wafers depends on the process conditions at the time. Some of them should be rescued. In addition, TSMC has insurance, and the actual loss should be further reduced.

But for customers, this is probably not good news, because the Fab14 P7 plant mainly produces automotive electronic chips, and the continuous shortage of such chips has seriously affected the production of the automotive industry.

In response to this, TSMC issued a statement: “TSMC’s wafer 14 P7 plant today caused a power outage in the plant due to abnormal cables at the Nanke ultra-high voltage substation. The colleagues in the plant have no safety concerns and no personnel have been evacuated. Currently, it has been rehabilitated by diesel generators. Power and Taipower will cooperate with Taipower to fully restore normal power supply. The actual impact will be clarified after normal power supply is restored.”

UMC Nanke’s 12-inch plant was also affected by the pressure drop, but UMC said that the plant area responded immediately and did not cause any impact on production and operation. In addition, Innolux, HannStar, Corning, and Nanmao all experienced pressure drop problems.

After emergency repairs, the power supply in the park has returned to normal, but the specific loss remains to be clarified.

  1. Errors in electrical equipment have caused fires, and the use of electrical pressure has been difficult to understand

In fact, this is not the first time that TSMC has experienced power equipment abnormalities. On the morning of March 31 this year, TSMC’s Fab12 P6 plant caught fire due to overloading of substation equipment.

According to Taiwan media reports, at that time, TSMC’s outsourced personnel were performing maintenance on the plant’s substation equipment. The substation equipment suddenly emitted white smoke, and the fire-fighting equipment immediately activated carbon dioxide fire fighting.

During the fire extinguishing process, one construction worker was choked by carbon dioxide. In addition, there were no other casualties, and it did not cause much impact on the operation of TSMC’s production line.

Going back, on August 15, 2017, due to human error, the 815 blackout occurred in Taiwan, China, which has a wide range of effects. Some media said that at that time, the Taiwanese government provided all the surplus power to chip manufacturers such as TSMC to reduce their losses.

In fact, TSMC’s power problem has always existed. TSMC founder Zhang Zhongmou has emphasized the power problem several times. He once said that the impact of power outages on TSMC is “almost impossible to estimate.”

Chip manufacturing is a huge resource-intensive industry. According to estimates by Greenpeace, TSMC’s electricity consumption accounts for nearly 5% of Taiwan’s total electricity consumption. According to the TSMC’s Corporate Social Responsibility Report, in 2019, TSMC’s global electricity consumption reached approximately 14.33 billion kWh, an increase of 5.412 billion kWh compared to five years ago. In 2019, Taiwan’s green energy power generation was 14 billion kWh, which can only be reached by TSMC alone. Usage.

When TSMC’s 3nm chip factory is launched, it is estimated that the power consumption of the 3nm factory alone will be as high as 7 billion kWh. According to data from Bloomberg industry research, due to the large-scale use of EUV lithography equipment for 5nm and 3nm, TSMC’s demand for electricity will double within 3 years. It is estimated that by the end of 2023, when TSMC’s 5nm and 3nm plants are operating at full speed, new circuit demand will be added. It will almost reach 98% of TSMC’s global electricity consumption in 2019.

Under such a large amount of electrical power, TSMC has also taken many actions, such as contracting wind farms, cooperating with equipment suppliers to develop “green machines”, and even TSMC has proposed a plan to build its own power plant, but it has not been approved. .

  1. “Natural disasters” such as droughts and earthquakes have continued without significant impacts

In addition to power problems, natural disasters such as droughts and earthquakes in Taiwan have also affected TSMC.

According to media reports, TSMC’s annual water consumption is between 16 billion and 17 billion tons. Its 8-inch wafer production line consumes 250 cubic meters of water per hour, and the 12-inch wafer production line can consume 500 cubic meters of water per hour. hour.

Since October last year, Taiwan’s water supply situation has been relatively severe. At present, due to climate reasons, there are 7 of Taiwan’s 21 major reservoirs with a storage capacity of less than half. The dry season may extend to May this year.

To this end, companies in Taiwan’s Hsinchu, Miaoli, and Taichung regions need to reduce water consumption by 7% to 11%. In order to prevent the drought from affecting production, TSMC has begun to transport water through water carts to supply some of its facilities.

On Tuesday, according to Xinhua News Agency, the person in charge of the Taiwan Disaster Response Center stated that he hopes that through measures such as “five stop and two” district water supply, water will be sustainable until the rainy season arrives. The spokesperson also stated that the current production in Taiwan’s science parks and industrial parks has not been affected.

In addition to facing water shortages, TSMC also suffered two consecutive earthquakes within 2 months.

On December 11, 2020, a 6.7-magnitude earthquake occurred in the waters of Yilan, Taiwan, and the earthquake was felt throughout Taiwan. On January 11 this year, another 5.9 magnitude earthquake occurred in Taiwan. In these two earthquakes, the earthquake intensity of TSMC’s northern plant reached 4, and some people were evacuated. TSMC stated that the two earthquakes “have not had a significant impact” on the company’s operations.

Conclusion: Chip production has been hit continuously, and costs may continue to rise

The high probability of a power outage in the TSMC power plant area will have a certain impact on chip production. Considering that the chip factories of Samsung, NXP, Infineon, etc., located in Austin, Texas, USA have also been shut down due to a snowstorm, the chip supply situation this year is not optimistic.

In this case, the chip supply problem, which is already in a tight supply, may be further fermented. If the demand for downstream applications remains high, the impact of a series of natural and man-made disasters on various chip factories may aggravate the imbalance between chip supply and demand, and the cost of chips will continue to rise.

Source: Taiwan Economic Daily, Taiwan United Daily News, Bloomberg News, Xinhua News Agency

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