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Comment by bsmitty5000 | Hacker News Reader

My first job out of school was final test for a semiconductor in Phoenix that had a small fab in Gilbert. I remember we took a rabbit suited tour there as part of the new hire orientation, it was pretty neat. The one thing though that stuck with me is how much water a fab needs on a daily basis. I can’t remember the exact number, I just remember thinking how stupid it was to build fabs in Phoenix.

But then again, the amount of lawns and greenways in Phoenix compared to a place like Tucson, it’s pretty clear most folks in Phoenix don’t much care about water conservation.

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I'm from Arizona and have thus wondered this and researched the perceived water dilemma myself. Fabs do need a considerable injection of water to start, but their systems are so advanced and their logistics so efficient that they end up reusing so much of it over time. Couple this with the fact that Arizona also has a great infrastructure already in place for water reuse and conservation. When Arizona had only 700,000 people in the 1950s, they used more water than they do now for 7,100,000 people. And it's still in the top 3 fastest growing states in the US (both by new relative to existing population, but also by total incoming population volume). Models also indicate that the once-in-a-century drought is coming to an end in the next few years, with huge rainfall amounts the last two years in the state.

There was a great ArsTechnica article and subsequent comment section where many of the water questions are addressed: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/06/why-do-chip-makers-k...

As an Arizona native, occasionally my paranoia about living in a desert and simultaneously living through world wide climate change begins to really worry me.

Inevitably I come to a conclusion that is very similar to yours. Arizona is pretty low on priority for water from the Colorado River and does a great job with water reclamation.

That being said, I worry if I'm just believing what I want to hear

At the very least, living in a desert is better for climate change than living somewhere you need to burn fossil fuels for heating.

Though you need a lot more AC during the summer. Something solar could provide but until it's more ubiquitous most power would still come from fossil fuels.

isn't desert colder at night?

Than day? Yes. Colder than Minnesota? No.

It's like a swimming pool. It takes a lot of water to initially fill it, but then it's cleaned and mostly recirculated/reused. In 2020, Intel used less water per chip than they did in 2010.

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/water-...

I wonder if they can reuse the water? I don’t know enough to know if this is PR speak or real.

https://www.globalwaterintel.com/news/2022/44/tsmc-leans-mor...

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