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According to the Nikkei Asian Review, in response to the once-in-50-year drought in Taiwan, the world’s largest chip foundry, TSMC, is building a factory that can treat industrial water so that the water can be reused for the manufacture of semiconductors. The company is part of an effort to solve Taiwan’s serious water shortage.

TSMC stated that this will be the world’s first advanced industrial wastewater treatment center and will gradually increase its industrial wastewater treatment capacity. It is expected to produce 67,000 tons of water per day by 2024. This water can be reused for chip manufacturing and will eventually satisfy Its average daily water demand for chip production is nearly half.

According to reports, this industrial wastewater treatment plant in Tainan is under construction and is expected to start operations at the end of 2021. Tainan is also TSMC’s most advanced chip production base, producing cutting-edge 5nm process chips for the latest Apple iPhone and MacBook processors.

According to TSMC’s latest sustainability report, TSMC currently uses 156,000 tons of water every day. The company recycled 133.6 million tons of water in 2019, but only a portion of it is pure enough to be reused in the chip manufacturing process.