quick lookup showed pure bismuth at $300/kg. That is not too expensive to make chips, but it would divert demand away from other uses, and we’re gonna need a bigger mine. China will find a way, and likely cost reductions will result from volume.
Still, this is a couple of years (wild optimism and resources devoted to it) at least away from Chip products.
Silicon is like $3/kg (and that’s the higher price, it’s actually cheaper than that outside USA). I’m not sure if we could sustain the same level of manufacturing using bismuth without side effects. One of the best things about silicon is that it’s the second most abundant element in Earth’s lithosphere (the first being oxygen)… I don’t think the “line must go up” attitude around pushing for Moore’s law is a worthy effort. I’d rather we pushed for software to be more efficient, I don’t feel my PC is significantly faster than it was 10 years ago, despite its Hz having doubled.
I could understand using this for specialized applications, but I’m not convinced it should be something that should be made as widespread as silicon tech, so I don’t think this should really be seen as a replacement for it.
I understand more bismuth mining would be needed to support price stability, but scale could mean lower prices. China has special needs in that innovation is required to escape US tyranny of global IP.
quick lookup showed pure bismuth at $300/kg. That is not too expensive to make chips, but it would divert demand away from other uses, and we’re gonna need a bigger mine. China will find a way, and likely cost reductions will result from volume.
Still, this is a couple of years (wild optimism and resources devoted to it) at least away from Chip products.
Silicon is like $3/kg (and that’s the higher price, it’s actually cheaper than that outside USA). I’m not sure if we could sustain the same level of manufacturing using bismuth without side effects. One of the best things about silicon is that it’s the second most abundant element in Earth’s lithosphere (the first being oxygen)… I don’t think the “line must go up” attitude around pushing for Moore’s law is a worthy effort. I’d rather we pushed for software to be more efficient, I don’t feel my PC is significantly faster than it was 10 years ago, despite its Hz having doubled.
I could understand using this for specialized applications, but I’m not convinced it should be something that should be made as widespread as silicon tech, so I don’t think this should really be seen as a replacement for it.
I understand more bismuth mining would be needed to support price stability, but scale could mean lower prices. China has special needs in that innovation is required to escape US tyranny of global IP.