[ExI] 18,000 Reasons It’s So Hard to Build a Chip Factory in America

Fri Dec 5 21:10:36 UTC 2025

In all seriousness, per Grok:

"Where it could actually work inside Nevada (still with far less hassle
than Arizona):

   - *Apex Industrial Park / North Las Vegas dry lake area* – already zoned
   heavy industrial, rail access, close to power and the existing workforce,
   and Clark County desperately wants it. TSMC looked there before Phoenix.
   - *Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center (TRIC)* east of Reno/Sparks – where
   Tesla Giga Nevada already is. Storey County has basically zero
   environmental pushback, cheap power from NV Energy, rail, I-80 access, and
   they’ve already permitted the biggest factory in the world.
   - *Fernley / Lyon County area* – 45 minutes east of Reno, flat, rail,
   already has a surprising amount of existing fab-related industry (server
   farms, etc.).

These places are not as gloriously empty as the US 95 diagonal, but they’re
already zoned, already have utilities corridors, and the counties will
literally roll out the red carpet and shoot the environmentalists for you
(figuratively… mostly).

Water is still the big issue anywhere in Nevada, but the state has already
approved several large-scale pipeline/desal proposals on paper (e.g., the
Southern Nevada Water Authority’s old Vegas-to-northern-counties pipeline
idea could be revived in the opposite direction if someone pays for it).

Bottom line: the “empty diagonal” fantasy dies on restricted military
ranges and UXO, but Nevada can absolutely absorb multiple TSMC-class fabs
if they’re placed in the existing industrial corridors that are already
pre-cleared. And yes, the state will happily look the other way on almost
everything else."

On Fri, Dec 5, 2025 at 2:02 PM Darin Sunley <dsunley at gmail.com> wrote:

> Only one problem:
>
> Much of that land has been zoned for the last fifty years for blowing sh*t
> up, uhhh, I mean "ordnance testing and flight training."
> Even ignoring the problem of potentially spicy missing toys buried in the
> sand, the only bureaucracy in USGov that moves slower than the EPA is the
> military.
>
> It's a lovely vision though.
>
> On Fri, Dec 5, 2025 at 1:56 PM spike jones via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org...
>>
>> *Subject:* [ExI] 18,000 Reasons It’s So Hard to Build a Chip Factory in
>> America
>>
>>
>>
>> >…18,000 Reasons It’s So Hard to Build a Chip Factory in America
>>
>>
>> https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/04/business/tsmc-phoenix-fab.html?unlocked_article_code=1.6U8.xJXN.ZcGk9HHLVf5i&smid=em-share
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Ja, 18k reasons why it is hard, but at least 19k reasons why we will do
>> it anyway.  Not necessarily in the Phoenix area.
>>
>>
>>
>> If you bring up a map of Nevada, you will see a big open area along that
>> diagonal stateline from Vegas to Reno.  That US 95 highway can be
>> four-laned and chip manufacturing can be set up there with a fraction of
>> the bother.  Reasoning: US chip manufacturing must meet federal, state,
>> county and city environmental regulations.  There are plenty of places
>> along US95 where there isn’t a city, so that doesn’t contribute, where the
>> county doesn’t care (Mineral county, nearly unpopulated Esmeralda and Ny
>> counties) and the state of Nevada will love the idea.  The state of Nevada
>> has traditionally been heavily dependent on tourist/harlotry/gambling
>> revenue, but over time, more and more people slake that appetite from home
>> on their computers (not that I personally… like…do anything of that
>> nature…or… anything (clarification: the gambling part (of course I am not
>> doing the tourist or harlotry online at home (what I have would never sell
>> (damn.))))
>>
>>
>>
>> The state of Nevada would cheerfully welcome the electronics fab industry
>> along that corridor from Vegas to Reno, and would help supply casino hitm…
>> uhhh rather… SECURITY… specialists… to take care of… rather to clear away
>> any… environmental protestors and such.  The state of Nevada is
>> experiencing slumping revenue, and is consequently very open and welcoming
>> of alternative revenue sources.
>>
>>
>>
>> OK then, city, county, state, all favor Way-to-hell-and-gone Nevada.
>> That leaves federal environmental regulations.  The Chevron decision of
>> 2024 means that even if there are federal environmental regulations, unless
>> they are law, passed by congress, what was once the equivalent of law are
>> now are merely executive branch rules subject to POTUS executive orders.  I
>> predict those federal level environmental regulations will not be a problem.
>>
>>
>>
>> Water: ja.  Pipes will be needed to haul in water, and I predict it will
>> need to be supplemented by solar desalinated seawater.  That means a lot of
>> pipes.  Nevada has a lot of clear skies and plenty of open land, so it
>> makes sense to harness solar energy for desalination.
>>
>>
>>
>> Unions: Nevada has plenty of that, but their unions revolve around the
>> entertainment/hospitality/gambling concessions.  The harlots union will be
>> cool with more people coming in (assuming there is a harlots union) and
>> their construction unions, well… let em strike.  But I don’t think they
>> will, because everywhere a chip fab is under construction, homes and
>> offices will be waaaaay under construction in parallel, so every
>> nail-pounder and wire puller will have all the work he wants.
>>
>>
>>
>> Then…  Bring in Taiwanese workers, let them do things their way, have
>> their meetings in Chinese if they wish.  There are Chinese-speaking
>> engineers, plenty of them, already in the states, born here.  A lot of them
>> live in the Bay area.
>>
>>
>>
>> Prediction (assuming the singularity doesn’t come in the next few years):
>> that corridor between Vegas and Reno will have nuclear plants, desalination
>> plants, new chip fabs, new (and nice) cities filled with new and nice
>> homes, advanced everything.  It will be cool.
>>
>>
>>
>> spike
>> _______________________________________________
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>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org
>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat
>>
>
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