News Ukraine Halts Output of Neon Gas, Chip Production at Risk

[Admin]

Producers of about half of semiconductor-grade neon supply are out of business.

Ukraine Halts Output of Neon Gas, Chip Production at Risk : Read more

 

[jkflipflop98]

Oh lawd! The neon! The neon!

All you have to do is freeze the air until it condenses and skim off the top. Is there some reason you can't make a cryofreezing setup in Oklahoma? Why are we so reliant on our enemy for something that's so easy to make? This sounds like a problem that would be solvable in under a month with a little government funding.

 

[InvalidError]

All you have to do is freeze the air until it condenses and skim off the top. Is there some reason you can't make a cryofreezing setup in Oklahoma? Why are we so reliant on our enemy for something that's so easy to make? This sounds like a problem that would be solvable in under a month with a little government funding.

Neon is 0.0018% of the atmosphere and since it is lighter than N2 and O2, most of it is in high altitude. Condensing enough sea-level air to retrieve a meaningful amount of neon is extremely energy-intensive and then you still have to refine it to the required purity afterwards. If getting neon from air was easy, chip fabs would capture their own exhaust to retrieve and re-refine it themselves.

 

[bigdragon]

Maybe we should learn a lesson from this. Specifically, maybe we should have producers spread out all around the world in a variety of locations instead of concentrating them in the cheapest and most financially efficient locations. Optimizing things for maximum profit and efficiency at the cost of redundancy and flexibility appears to be an ongoing systemic flaw no one has dared to take action on.

 

[Co BIY]

Optimizing for efficiency globally is why we have such large increases in global wealth.

Your proposed solution only looks at one simple straight forward but expensive way to solve the problem. (and takes the problem away from those most effected by it)

Allowing the price to rise incentivizes everyone with an interest in high purity Neon production to look at an infinite number of solutions.

• Working without it.
• Reducing requirements.
• Figuring out how to work with lower purity.
• Substitution.
• Recycling.
• New methods of production.
• Dozens of ideas I can't imagine because I'm far from the problem and don't know much about any of it. (although I'm probably as knowledgeable as the politicians who would be involved in subsidizing and planning any strategic neon production plan).

 

[Chung Leong]

All you have to do is freeze the air until it condenses and skim off the top. Is there some reason you can't make a cryofreezing setup in Oklahoma? Why are we so reliant on our enemy for something that's so easy to make? This sounds like a problem that would be solvable in under a month with a little government funding.

I don't think such an operation would be economically viable when there're no steel mills around to use up the oxygen and nitrogen, the bulk of what gets produced.

 

[Co BIY]

CRYOIN WEBSITE - Patents

Apparently it's not just about global efficiency but also about Intellectual Property.

US Patent 9,168,467 - Owned by CRYOIN - The invention relates to cryogenic technology, specifically, to devices for obtaining components of gas mixtures by rectification method, particularly, gas mixtures characterized by a small value of separation factor, for example, neon isotopes.

They know how to celebrate the rare gasses in Odessa ! - Also from the company Website

I hope the region sees peace soon.

 

[Deleted member 14196]

They should do

Neon is 0.0018% of the atmosphere and since it is lighter than N2 and O2, most of it is in high altitude. Condensing enough sea-level air to retrieve a meaningful amount of neon is extremely energy-intensive and then you still have to refine it to the required purity afterwards. If getting neon from air was easy, chip fabs would capture their own exhaust to retrieve and re-refine it themselves.

But still we must be independent necessity is the mother of invention and we must find a way around this or we are all screwed

 

[Co BIY]

Apparently the concentration of Noble gas production in Russia and the Ukraine is a remnant of Soviet Military Industrial Policy.

"Neon was regarded as a strategic resource in the former Soviet Union, because it was believed to be required for the intended production of laser weapons for missile and satellite defense purposes in the 1980s. Accordingly, all major air separation units in the Soviet Union were equipped with neon, but also krypton and xenon, enrichment facilities or, in some cases, purification plants (cf. Sections 5.4 and 5.5). The domestic Soviet supply of neon was extremely large but demand low."

DERA Rohstoffinformationen Noble gases – supply really critical?

 

[InvalidError]

Allowing the price to rise incentivizes everyone with an interest in high purity Neon production to look at an infinite number of solutions.

• Working without it.
• Reducing requirements.
• Figuring out how to work with lower purity.
• Substitution.
• Recycling.
• New methods of production.
• Dozens of ideas I can't imagine because I'm far from the problem and don't know much about any of it. (although I'm probably as knowledgeable as the politicians who would be involved in subsidizing and planning any strategic neon production plan).

As far as chip fabrication is concerned, the reason high purity noble gasses are required is for things like metal vapor deposition and ion implantation which require a shielding/carrier gas that won't react with or contaminate metal/dopant ions. The only possible substitute for one high-purity noble gas there would be another high-purity noble gas, which wouldn't help much since they are all refined by the same companies. With how monstrously accurate ion deposition processes need to be to make 5nm work, I doubt any fab wants to have to re-tool and re-tune their process for different gasses even if there were viable substitutions.

The most likely solution would be along the reuse, recycle and recover axis - avoid getting it direct from air as much as possible..

 

[jkflipflop98]

Neon is 0.0018% of the atmosphere and since it is lighter than N2 and O2, most of it is in high altitude. Condensing enough sea-level air to retrieve a meaningful amount of neon is extremely energy-intensive and then you still have to refine it to the required purity afterwards. If getting neon from air was easy, chip fabs would capture their own exhaust to retrieve and re-refine it themselves.

And how, exactly, do you think it's currently produced for industrial application?

It's not very hard to do at all. Again, there's no reason you couldn't setup a neon production facility in North Dakota and have it operational in a month.

 

[hannibal]

It just show how inter connected we have become with the world. Production goes where it is cheap. And when production concentrates, it get harder and harder to someone else to get same results because know how is also collected to the same place. TSMC has got the lead in chip production. Everyone else is in trouble of even keeping up. Same with everything else. Do you know how depended on Chinese owned raw materials we are now? I can only say that they own most of materials that are needed for electric car batteries... What else...

 

[Co BIY]

And how, exactly, do you think it's currently produced for industrial application?

It's not very hard to do at all. Again, there's no reason you couldn't setup a neon production facility in North Dakota and have it operational in a month.

It is currently produced in a process where the major constituents of air liquification (Oxygen, Nitrogen - 99% of the air) are needed for other economically viable industrial processes (Large-scale steel production) and therefore pay for the largest part of the process.

Without a paying use for the 99% of the air processed the extraction of the noble gasses becomes 100X more expensive.

 

[jkflipflop98]

It is currently produced in a process where the major constituents of air liquification (Oxygen, Nitrogen - 99% of the air) are needed for other economically viable industrial processes (Large-scale steel production) and therefore pay for the largest part of the process.

Without a paying use for the 99% of the air processed the extraction of the noble gasses becomes 100X more expensive.

So what? Worst case scenario the price goes up 100x. That's still infinitely better than having none at all. There's an edwards facility directly across the street that makes all the gasses we use in our facility. There are very few that are sourced from anywhere else.

 

[InvalidError]

So what? Worst case scenario the price goes up 100x. That's still infinitely better than having none at all.

At 100X the current going rate, I bet there will be many products that won't be economically viable anymore, many of which may come as a complete surprise.

 

[lazyabum]

Neon is 0.0018% of the atmosphere and since it is lighter than N2 and O2, most of it is in high altitude. Condensing enough sea-level air to retrieve a meaningful amount of neon is extremely energy-intensive and then you still have to refine it to the required purity afterwards. If getting neon from air was easy, chip fabs would capture their own exhaust to retrieve and re-refine it themselves.

You wouldn't say that if you know how many and much gases US Navy ships have. Several times more than they need at any given time.

 

[InvalidError]

You wouldn't say that if you know how many and much gases US Navy ships have. Several times more than they need at any given time.

Most of the noble gas supply was initially created for military applications where cost mostly doesn't matter. Doesn't make the gasses any less rare, whole process any less expensive or any less energy-intensive.

 

[jkflipflop98]

At 100X the current going rate, I bet there will be many products that won't be economically viable anymore, many of which may come as a complete surprise.

With absolutely no gas whatsoever, there are many, many products that won't be viable anymore, either. Which should come as no surprise but apparently is.

 

[wbfox]

The best part is that this isn't even the first neon gas shortage/"crisis" there has been. The last one was in 2015. So everyone knew about this. What did anyone do in the past 7 years? lol. Profit. That's what.

 

[lazyabum]

Most of the noble gas supply was initially created for military applications where cost mostly doesn't matter. Doesn't make the gasses any less rare, whole process any less expensive or any less energy-intensive.

Thanks to us taxpayers. I just know that all of these shortages are costing us big-time.

 

[samopa]

Maybe we should learn a lesson from this. Specifically, maybe we should have producers spread out all around the world in a variety of locations instead of concentrating them in the cheapest and most financially efficient locations. Optimizing things for maximum profit and efficiency at the cost of redundancy and flexibility appears to be an ongoing systemic flaw no one has dared to take action on.

If, somehow, China decide to do samething to Taiwan like Russia do to Ukraine, then we will have serious IT issue. 😱😱😱

 

[Chung Leong]

If, somehow, China decide to do samething to Taiwan like Russia do to Ukraine, then we will have serious IT issue. 😱😱😱

No worries. At the rate things are going the world will soon experience a 100% drop in demand for computer hardware.

 

[watzupken]

Maybe we should learn a lesson from this. Specifically, maybe we should have producers spread out all around the world in a variety of locations instead of concentrating them in the cheapest and most financially efficient locations. Optimizing things for maximum profit and efficiency at the cost of redundancy and flexibility appears to be an ongoing systemic flaw no one has dared to take action on.

In theory yes. But in practice, it is not easy. That is why the world is stuck with this problem where it needs to depend on certain nation(s) for certain products. Imagine if Ukraine is happily churning out Neon at X price, but because you are not efficient at producing it, you need to sell it at double the price. Who do you think will buy from you? You can’t just sit around not selling much because they have high costs to maintain, and won’t make it just waiting for the day that supply will be disrupted.

 

[watzupken]

If, somehow, China decide to do samething to Taiwan like Russia do to Ukraine, then we will have serious IT issue. 😱😱😱

You are not wrong. China and Taiwan both have a significant impact when it comes to manufacturing and provision of raw materials. In my opinion, this problem will happen, and just a matter of when. Which I suspect is one of the reasons the likes of TSMC is diversifying outside of Taiwan, or asked to come to a country to produce cutting edge nodes. But that only solves part of the problem because things like rare earth is mostly produced in China, and China is also the world’s factory. So if China get slapped with sanctions, you can be sure there will be dramatic impact into every aspect of live, no matter what US is trying to do to move chip production to their country. The world is more interdependent than we think we know.