According to Taiwan media reports, UMC is located in the 8A and 8B plant areas of Zhukelixing Road. A power failure occurred in the afternoon of the 9th. UMC CFO Liu Qidong confirmed that the smoke from the emergency power generation system caused the public to mistakenly believe that a fire occurred. Liu Qidong said that the 8A and 8B plants affected by the power outage accounted for about half of UMC’s 8-inch wafer production capacity, which is suspected to be caused by component failures. The exact cause remains to be further investigated. The power supply is still being supplied by the backup power generation system.
According to Wang Yongzhuang, Director of the Bamboo Science Administration, according to a report from the Environmental Safety Group of the Bamboo Science Administration, UMC’s internal power equipment Cable1611 was damaged and the nitrogen equipment failed. The on-site backup nitrogen system supply increased, and the evaporator power increased, causing water condensation. The amount of smoke increased; the original nitrogen equipment has been activated and the backup equipment has been closed. In addition, due to electrical equipment failure, a loud noise was made when the generator was activated, and the diesel fuel burned incompletely to emit black smoke during the initial start-up period, which caused the public to misunderstand the fire alarm.
Suddenly there was an explosion from UMC this afternoon and heavy smoke came out of the roof. The Hsinchu Fire Department dispatched a chemical truck to rescue. Firefighters came to the scene and found that the plant was faulty due to the overload of the generators in the plant. Some black smoke and white smoke were emitted from the water vapor. There was no fire.
UMC CFO Liu Qidong confirmed that a power outage occurred in the 8AB plant area in the afternoon, and it was suspected to be a component failure and no casualties. Mainly because the generator started to emit smoke, the plant is currently out of power and the emergency power generation system has been activated. Regarding the impact on operations, he said that UMC's 8A and 8B fabs accounted for about half of UMC’s 8-inch wafer fab.
Liu Qidong said that the cause of the power outage is still under investigation. It is expected that the power supply will be restored soon, and there are no casualties. The uninterruptible power system has been activated, and production will be resumed when the power is fully restored. Slightly affect operations. As the current 8-inch production capacity continues to be in short supply, the accident is expected to make the supply tight situation more severe.
The 8AB, 8C, and 8D factories affected by UMC have a total monthly production capacity of more than 130,000 8-inch units. Liu Qidong said that the power jump accident will lose a small part of the production capacity for half a day, and will make up for the lost capacity gap as much as possible. It is expected to slightly affect the operation, and the actual impact remains to be checked.