By Emma Bishop
If the world’s future is powered by semiconductors and designed by advanced AI chips, then it will be printed on polysilicon; the purest manmade material and the foundation for any semiconductor chip. Without it, advanced technologies and electronics would not exist.
Importantly, the U.S. currently faces a decision: to rely on imported polysilicon from China to unlock the electronic economy, or to protect and expand existing capacity across the U.S. and allied nations to feed the growing demand for chips, and therefore for polysilicon. The ongoing Section 232 investigation into imported polysilicon is at the heart of this opportunity, as it allows the U.S. to confront China’s stranglehold on a key advanced material head-on. The investigation provides the federal government with the opportunity to enforce tariffs, quotas, or other import restrictions on Chinese polysilicon, and raises the question of how strong a stance the administration will take to cut dependence on volatile supply chains for vital technologies.
What makes this Section 232 decision unique is that polysilicon is one of a few materials the U.S. already produces in sufficient quantities. Today, the U.S. has approximately 50,000 metric tons (MT) of active production, with an additional 16,000 MT of announced new capacity and 17,600 MT of idled capacity that could be restarted. This production capacity, bolstered by supply from allies, is sufficient to meet expected U.S. demand.
China controls the polysilicon market and erodes global competition by producing more than double the polysilicon needed to meet global demand. State-backed programs including massive subsidies, limited environmental oversight, and forced labor programs targeting Uyghur workers are taken advantage of by Chinese entities as they produce polysilicon far below free-market prices. Cratering the global price for these materials enables China’s supply chain network to undermine the short- and long-term financial viability of U.S. and allied companies.
This moment demands uncompromising policy to protect American jobs and capabilities while reducing our dependence on the global behemoth that controls these markets, and the Section 232 investigation provides an opportunity to seize it. Yet, at such a critical time, some groups are calling on the administration to implement a tariff-rate quota (TRQ), which guarantees access to underpriced material by designating the amount of Chinese polysilicon that can enter the market duty-free. This approach does nothing to counter China’s anti-competitive, market-manipulative tactics, and instead institutionalizes dependence on an adversary while leaving American industry and workers out to dry. leaving American industry and workers out to dry.
As PV Tech recently noted, policymakers face key design questions for the 232: Will restrictions only cover raw polysilicon or extend to wafers, cells, and modules? Will enforcement differ by region, creating carve-outs for “friendly” exporters? Those questions are irrelevant if the U.S. begins with a quota for Chinese content – undermining the very goal of the Section 232 investigation, which is to address national security vulnerabilities associated with import reliance. In addition, a quota signals an interest in this cheaper material despite the ramifications of this dependence, leading importers to also relabel shipments, reroute through third countries, and exploit country-of-origin loopholes. That is not a trade remedy; it’s a blueprint for circumvention.
As with rare earths, we have seen what happens when the U.S. becomes dependent on a foreign adversary. Repeating mistakes that hurt existing domestic capacity in the interest of cheaper material is a short-term political compromise with long-term implications for U.S. competitiveness and technological leadership. Working closely with our G-7 partners presents an opportunity to coordinate restrictions on Chinese-origin or -linked polysilicon, close circumvention pathways, and create a unified front among free-market economies to prevent dependence on artificially low-cost polysilicon fraught with abusive labor regimes and environmental negligence.
The United States does not need half-measures. It needs clear, uncompromising enforcement that restores domestic market confidence. A full prohibition on imports of Chinese-origin and -linked polysilicon and derivatives ensures a competitive, transparent, and reliable supply chain for the material, unlocking a new era of advanced technologies. Anything less will leave American manufacturing expertise vulnerable, American jobs on the line, and America’s national security at risk.
Emma Bishop is the President of the Advanced Materials Security Council (AMSC) and a Vice President at Venn Strategies. Alex Rubin is a nonresident senior fellow at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF).
This article was originally published by RealClearPolicy and made available via RealClearWire.
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If the world’s future is powered by semiconductors and designed by advanced AI chips, then it will be printed on polysilicon.
Back in April this year I bought an Apple Mac mini; primarily for recording music purposes.
It was a bargain at the time costing just £199 and with 32GB RAM not at all bad. Then as the year progressed the AI/datacentre thing exploded, and now as a consequence RAM is getting short in supply, and rather expensive:
RAMageddon is here. As you’ve no doubt heard (or experienced), the price of RAM has skyrocketed in the space of just a few weeks […] With a huge influx of demand from AI and data center companies scooping up DDR5 RAM and SSD memory, consumers are seeing prices spiking not just for RAM and storage for their computers, but also for everything that uses it. Given the tech industry’s infatuation with AI, this problem likely won’t end soon. – Tom’s Guide
That sounds like a polysilicon opportunity to me.
“likely won’t end soon”
As the size of the components on semiconductor chips shrink, the technology to fabricate them becomes more difficult and expensive. There are only a couple (literally) companies that build the machines that make them so it takes time to acquire the machine and ramp up those new fabrication lines and they cost billions. I have no doubt that they’ll catch up to the demand but it may take a couple years. With the Chinese Communist Party running a comprehensive and aggressive economic war against the U.S. and the rest of the world we need those industries relocated to America. A world where the totalitarian, imperialist, and oppressive ChiComs dominate economically and politically is a very bad place.
Getting rid of competitors through dumping has always been China’s way of conquering markets,
sometimes even violating intellectual property rights through implementation of industrial spying.
It high time to react against it.
It seems to me China’s western competitors – ie all of us – were only to eager to offshore emissions (virtue signalled) – and manufacturing to China. China has spent years building its road and belt and now it has everyone by the gonads.
were?
Dumping is an expensive way to lose money. It takes five minutes with pretend companies to show that predatory pricing hurts the predator more than consumers or competitors. I’ve done it, anyone can do it. If China wants to distort their own economy with inefficient allocation of resources and give us cheap products while our workers create valuable products, they are only hurting themselves to gift us cheap products that our skilled workers would be wasting their time on.
All this claptrap about reshoring or onshoring overlooks the fact that our manufacturing capacity and production is higher than ever because our production requires skilled workers and China’s production requires unskilled workers. Demanding we bring those unskilled jobs “back” is like demanding PhD mathematicians spend their time calculating sales taxes.
Except even those “unskilled jobs” are good for the economy and better than unemployment. It looks like you drank the offshoring Kool Aid. We were told offshoring would give more opportunities for the unskilled to up their game and then we watched as even those jobs were offshored (like help centers). All we did was reduce China’s unemployment and transfer it to the West.
An industry that can be attacked by dumping is no longer “high tech”. Processor chips took a lot of genius and innovation to invent –
“Intel’s first processor was the Intel 4004, released in November 1971, and it’s recognized as the world’s first commercially available microprocessor, a “computer on a chip” that kicked off the age of general-purpose computing”
2025-1971 = more than 50 years since invention.
At this point its very complicated breakfast cereal.
Emma has it right.
I think if Trump knows the story Emma tells here, he would put those 17,000 idled American polysilicon workers back to work.
As long as you don’t call it that, Americans love their fascism.
You have a very strange definition of fascism.
See “spintronics” for new technology for storage.
If you want to see UK first check out the garbage being trotted out
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/dec/18/massive-disruption-uk-worst-case-climate-crisis-risks
UK temperature 4 or 6 degree warmer, 6 degree colder, sea rises of 2M … apparently they are all plausible predictions 🙂
Look at the data and you will see that they are not plausible at all.
Question to UK residents “Would you like UK temperature to be 4 or 6 degree warmer?”
Yes please
They are simply using the precautionary principle on steroids.
The secrets of the CCP are as vast as it’s overproduction of goods and weapons. It is only matched by the lack of scrutiny by the EU, UN, and the climate crusades.
One of these days, we will have a Government that understands that China is the enemy in every way; a military enemy, an economic enemy a social enemy and a cultural enemy. We should do all we can to avoid any form of trade with these beasts.
It is the CCP and its current dictator Xi Jinping. There is big internal conflict in the CCP= there is a faction that wants to end Xi and his hardcore approach. Russia has big problems….and Iran…..and Venezuela…..the west should push hard now to bring about big changes.
Including letting Chinese get PhD education at American Universities.
I have Chinese friends, so I do not say that with any kind of joy.
These two paragraphs confuse me.
If we already produce sufficient quantities, and have 17,600 tons of idle capacity, why does anyone plan to build another 16,000 tons? It’s not that I think someone is telling porkies, but there’s something missing.
How can China control the market when we make enough for ourselves and have idle capacity and still plan to build more capacity? Is our portion of the market so minuscule that we are not a factor in global demand?
Prices adjust so that supply equals demand. If China alone produces more than double the global demand, are they stockpiling the excess? If not, that means someone is buying that excess, that’s called demand, and no, China is not producing any excess let alone more than doouble demand; they are producing exactly as much as the market demands. That IS the market price. Quibbling about a “free market” price is pointless. Trump’s tariffs aren’t exactly part of a free market either.
If the point of the article is to complain about predatory Chinese pricing distorting the market, it takes 5 minutes with pencil and paper to show that predatory pricing hurts the predator more than consumers or competitors, and the US, by the first paragraph’s own admission, produces enough for itself with current capacity to spare and more planned. Self-evidently, China’s predatory pricing isn’t very effective if US companies are planning on building more production capacity.
“why does anyone plan to build another 16,000 tons”
Possible to wean our friends and allies off the cheap Chinese products?
Of course. But that makes a mockery of predatory pricing claims.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Oil_Co._of_New_Jersey_v._United_States
Basically, China is trying to use the same tactics against the world.
Standard Oil is a lousy example of monopoly, of predatory pricing, everything. Predatory pricing does not work. If the Standard Oil monopoly case is the best you’ve got, then you’ve got nothing.
“China controls the polysilicon market and erodes global competition by producing more than double the polysilicon needed to meet global demand. State-backed programs including massive subsidies, limited environmental oversight, and forced labor programs targeting Uyghur workers are taken advantage of by Chinese entities as they produce polysilicon far below free-market prices. Cratering the global price for these materials enables China’s supply chain network to undermine the short- and long-term financial viability of U.S. and allied companies.”
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So the US makes plenty, but China is willing to weaken its own economy by subsidizing production of polysilicon.
We should buy all their supply then we can sell it to other countries.
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Look up how Henry Dow defeated the German bromine cartel for an historical example.
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Subsidies and protectionism increases our cost of living.
Multiple agriculture commodities are higher priced because of such policies imposed during the Great Depression. Sugar is three times the global price because of them.
Wheat, corn, cherries, peanuts, dairy and others are likewise affected.
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60% of imported goods are used by domestic manufacturers as inputs to their production, so tariffs on those goods will have a negative effect wherein the must either take a hit in their profits, or raise their prices which reduces their competitiveness in foreign markets.
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There’s no ultimate solution to the problem of satisfying our wants and needs, only trade-offs.
“If the world’s future is powered by semiconductors…”
Words belong in the 1990’s
And reading more comments it seems we’ve forgotten that semiconductors belong to an asset class that used to be called “cyclicals”. It’s a business that hires thousands and lays off thousands on a schedule smarty-pantses and snake-oilers used to forecast with stochastic charts. If they’re still doing that after all these decades… then it didn’t work.
I believe a word is missing. The world’s future economies…. perhaps.
I may be wrong but polysilicon is primarily used for solar cells. Integrated circuits require monocrystalline silicon. Maybe polysiliconis a raw material but so is sand.
Are the authors of this article familiar with semiconductor manufacturing? I am.
I am struggling to understand this. China’s use of slave labor is mentioned, yet expensive machinery is mentioned and limited machinery suppliers. What part do each of these play in the manufacturing of polysilicon chips? Second do these chips have a shelf life? Could we create a strategic reserve similar to petroleum? Will polysilicon ever be replaced by something else? If not we could build our strategic reserve while at the same time investing and promoting our abilities to build these chips competitively in country.
Large-scale U.S polysilicon production? Forget it.
Brief Cost Summary (Michigan vs. China)
Total Gap: Michigan production can easily be $1,000–$1,500 per ton more expensive than China—before factoring CAPEX amortization for environmental systems.
Honest Narrative
Large-scale polysilicon production in the U.S. under current “dreamland” environmental regulations is economically unrealistic. The Michigan plant is an anomaly—likely subsidized or niche—and cannot scale without massive cost penalties.
Why?
Bottom line: The U.S. will not be a major polysilicon producer under 2025 regulations. Domestic quartz demand is dominated by specialty uses—like high-purity sand for upscale golf courses—not industrial-scale solar or semiconductor feedstock.
The Michigan polysilicon plant is the only operational facility of its kind in the United States, producing high-purity material for niche applications. Under current 2025 environmental regulations, it relies on costly closed-loop acid recovery and hazardous waste treatment systems to comply with strict EPA standards.
These compliance and cost burdens make it the last remaining U.S. polysilicon producer, with no realistic path for large-scale expansion.