REC Silicon, a Norwegian silane gas and silicon producer, has said that it will make its first commercial shipment of ultra-high purity polysilicon from its recently restarted Moses Lake facility in the US state of Washington in October.
The company said the plant is “running well” and meeting production volumes for commercial shipments, with impurities reduced to acceptable levels for its customer.
However, the shipment has been delayed to mid-October due to a final qualification step by the customer.
The Moses Lake facility closed in March 2020, after being affected by then-US President Donald Trump’s trade talks with China. Plans for its reopening were revealed in June 2022 and production restarted in November 2023, following a 10-year take-or-pay supply agreement for high-purity fluidized bed reactor granular polysilicon with South Korea's Qcells.
REC Silicon’s latest update adds that all construction activities related to the site’s reopening are now complete.
The company said the restart will enable it to “provide ultra-high purity polysilicon to the US solar value chain.” It also expects to supply silane gas in “significant volumes for anode materials to a fast-growing battery industry.”
“We will soon be beginning a new phase for the facility where efforts are transitioning to continuous quality improvement to exceed the market standard, ramp-up and optimization,” said CEO Kurt Levens. “There is still a large amount of work to be accomplished. We will strive to reach our full commercial production capacity as soon as we can while maintaining our focus on product quality.”
In February, REC Silicon said its wholly owned subsidiary, REC Advanced Silicon Materials LLC, was shutting down polysilicon production capacity at its facility in Butte, Montana, primarily due to regional structural imbalances in supply and demand for electricity.
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