As industries are getting to reopen after four months, let’s check out the 9 largest silicon producing countries in the world from Insider Monkey’s blog. Silicon is used for producing semi conductors, which are one of the most important technological inventions in all the human history. The United States is the home to the largest companies that use silicon in the world, but yet, it’s not the biggest producer. There are six companies with seven plants to produce silicon, all of them near East of the Mississippi River.
Silicon is not only used in the semi conductor industry, but it’s also an essential element in producing aluminium alloys, or it’s primary raw material in the chemical industry. What’s more, we can find its use in the solar energy industry, too. As we mentioned above, the United States needs a lot of silicon, but it doesn’t produce enough, therefore it imports from other countries. Russia is the biggest exporter to the US when it comes to silicon, actually it is 38% of the total silicon import of the States. The next one is China with its 13% of export to the US, then Brazil at 8%. Recently silicon production has decreased because of declining demand and present inventories.
And let’s see the numbers about the 9 largest silicon producing countries in the world.
9. Iceland
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 83
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 80
8. Bhutan
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 90
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 90
7. France
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 140
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 140
6. Malaysia
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 140
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 15
5. Brazil
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 220
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 210
4. United States of America
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 430
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 320
3. Norway
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 370
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 370
2. Russia
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 600
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 600
1. China
Production of silicon in 2018 (in thousand metric tons): 4,800
Production of silicon in 2019 (in thousand metric tons): 4,500
Unsurprisingly, China hits the top on the list of 9 largest silicon producing countries in the world. If you see the numbers, you can recognize that China produces much more silicon than all the countries across the globe.
