REC Silicon jobs remain secure

MOSES LAKE - Despite tough global market conditions for renewable energy companies, jobs at REC Silicon's Moses Lake plant are safe according to company executives.

REC executive vice president Tore Torvund said yesterday that nearly 200 companies in the renewable energy industry around the world had to either cut back on operations or shut down plants completely. But due to new technologies developed in Moses Lake and the low cost of operations, the local facility has been able to remain open.

The plant has a workforce of about 540 employees, the biggest REC Silicon operation based in the United States.

"That's been my challenge here in Moses Lake, to keep things going," Torvund told the Grant County Economic Development council. "We have talented people, a very cost-conscious organization and the latest technology."

Torvund said that the company's unique fluidized bed reactor, or FBR process, lowers the cost of making their solar products and uses less electricity. The Moses Lake plant uses this technology, which allows REC Silicon to lower overall costs.

And lower costs is what gives REC Silicon a competitive edge over other renewable energy companies going after the same major customers. According to Torvund, there is no lack of natural resources to create renewable energy and the company expects the need for renewable energy to continue to climb in the next few decades.

However, due to the interest in the solar energy industry a few years back, companies are now having to deal with a problem of oversupply.

"There's nothing wrong with the market, it's a healthy market," he said. "The problem is that a lot of companies, funds and money have been put into solar energy. There has been an overinvestment."

The top five companies in the industry alone will produce enough products to supply the demand until at least 2014, according to REC Silicon figures. This has caused other companies to idle plant operations and in some extreme cases, declare bankruptcy.

Although REC has managed to stay afloat, some of their planned expansions had to be put on hold. One of their expansions was to take place at the Moses Lake plant, said Torvund.

"There is no reason to invest in new capacity when we have an oversupply situation that we will have for at least some years," he said.

And companies in Korea, China and parts of Europe have not been able to compete on the market due to the oversupply, so Torvund added that REC Silicon had to work even harder to keep its U.S. plants in the black.

Although he believes the demand will eventually increase again, Torvund said his challenge is to find ways for REC Silicon to stay in the competition until that happens.

Over the past 10 years, employees at the Moses Lake plant have been developing a new technology that will allow them to make the same products, more efficiently. Unlike the Siemens technology widely available within the industry, this new technology will allow REC Silicon to use less energy in their production stage.

"This is a tremendous achievement," he said, adding that the new technology has the lowest cost globally when it comes to making silicon.

Keeping this technology within the company, is vital to maintaining their competitive edge, said Torvund. So even though their labor costs are higher than other countries, their lower overall production costs allow REC Silicon to compete globally he said.

Torvund also mentioned that the company is busy lobbying against national efforts to add a duty to solar products sent from the United States to China. Since 80 percent of its customers are in China, an added cost to their products could result in REC Silicon losing business to Chinese or Korean companies who could provide the same products for less.

In order to keep developing new technologies in Moses Lake, Torvund said REC Silicon is actively looking to fill several specialized positions at the plant.

"We're looking for more skilled people, and more motivated people," he said.