londons_explore 2 days ago

My understanding is it isn't a new factory. Wasn't the equipment moved from another operational factory so they could get up and running quicker?

  • turnsout 2 days ago

    To build a factory from scratch you must first invent the universe

  • nemacol 2 days ago

    AFAIK TSMC does not manufacture the machines they use to create processors so in any case they would be moving the equipment into a facility.

  • asadm 2 days ago

    yeah I mean this isn't factorio...

TheRealWatson 2 days ago

Also, doesn't chip manufacturing require a lot of water? Water is not the first thing that comes to mind when I hear Arizona. I think I'm about to learn a lot with this.

  • caseyohara 2 days ago

    Yes, ~10 million gallons per day (equivalent to 33,000 households). But the plant's water recycling and re-use is very efficient, so it's mostly a one-time hit up front.

  • BurningFrog 2 days ago

    From what I read the overriding factor was geological stability. Apparently these factories are very sensitive to vibrations. I guess when you do precision work at nanometer scale these things matter.

    Arizona isn't water rich, but it manages to keep the 4 million people around Phoenix hydrated, so there is water.

    • kristofferR 2 days ago

      > From what I read the overriding factor was geological stability.

      Guess they are tired of dealing with all of Taiwan's earthquakes.

  • buzzert 2 days ago

    Arizona actually has a lot of water because of several successful and ambitious irrigation projects in the last century.

    So much so, that it has become an agricultural region for growing notoriously water intensive crops like alfalfa and pistachios.

    • rurp 2 days ago

      It's notoriously unsustainable. Those water intensive crops would be wildly infeasible if the farmers had to pay anything close to a market price for the obscene amounts of limited water they consume.

webninja 19 hours ago

Elon Musk did it with his Giga Factory somewhere in the range of 11 to 14 months in Texas. It’s 5 times the size of the pentagon and they build more than just top of the line Tesla Chips there.

Some states have less regulations than others. He said if he tried that in California, it would take an unlimited and indefinite time to complete (100 years+) due to so many permits and regulations.