Does All Semiconductor Manufacturing Depend on Spruce Pine Quartz?

Here’s an idea you see spreading across the internet every so often: that all semiconductor and solar PV manufacturing depends on extremely pure quartz from the town of Spruce Pine, North Carolina. This quartz is used to make the crucibles which hold the molten silicon as it gets turned into silicon ingots, which are then cut into wafers and made into chips. The quartz needs to be very pure to prevent impurities from seeping into the silicon, and Spruce Pine is where this very pure quartz comes from. Spruce Pine quartz started to get major attention after it was mentioned in Ed Conway’s 2023 book Material World, though it was also mentioned in Vince Beiser’s 2018 book The World in a Grain. Interest spiked following Hurricane Helene amidst concerns that flood damage to the Spruce Pine mines might shut down supply: articles showed up in places like NPR, Forbes, and Axios. Spruce Pine quartz is often discussed in apocalyptic terms. The implication is that if something happened to the mine

Here’s an idea you see spreading across the internet every so often: that all semiconductor and solar PV manufacturing depends on extremely pure quartz from the town of Spruce Pine, North Carolina. This quartz is used to make the crucibles which hold the molten silicon as it gets turned into silicon ingots, which are then cut into wafers and made into chips. The quartz needs to be very pure to prevent impurities from seeping into the silicon, and Spruce Pine is where this very pure quartz comes from. Spruce Pine quartz started to get major attention after it was mentioned in Ed Conway’s 2023 b