Good morning, welcome to the presentation of the fourth quarter for REC Silicon. I'm Tore Torvund, the President and CEO of REC Silicon, and we are all today in the U.S., so I have brought my colleagues to this presentation so you can listen to their view. These are mainly the people responsible for the different areas we are going to present today. Let me start. Let's say I will present the highlights, James May, financial reviews. Can you go back one? Kurt Levens, responsible for our Butte Operations, will take silicon gas. Francine Sullivan and Chuck Sutton will give an update on the PV market. I will come back with a short update on Yulin, and Francine will then cover the battery update. Next. The highlights for fourth quarter, we had a revenue of $36 million and a positive EBITDA of $1.9.
The cash balance is today $ 134.9 million. We have a cash increase of $ 99 million, mainly due to the private placement of $ 1 billion, which was done in October. The cash outflow from operating activities was $2.8 million. The very positive development we see on the silane silicon gas volume, it was 881 metric tons, compared to 746 metric tons in Q3. This is one of the strongest quarter we have on silicon gas. Kurt Levens will cover all the details there. A minor reduction in the gas price of some 2.8%. Also, on the polysilicon side, we are very satisfied with the numbers. We sold 250 metric tons of high-quality polysilicon to the semiconductor industry. I think we have already covered the private placement of equity in October. That is, let's say, what was in this quarter.
On the solar material, as we are not into this market, as you know, due to the fact that we have still this trade war going on between China and the U.S. We see now that there is definitely a very good balance between the demand and supply of polysilicon. It is also expected that the demand for PV will continue to grow, and that will definitely then need more polysilicon to be brought online, in the near future. Also, we will give an update on the battery development. There is a high level of interest within those who are working with the silicon anode side, and we are talking to several companies. As you remember, we have an MoU with G14, and Francine will also cover this part of it.
On the Yulin JV, we have decided to write down the investment to zero in our book. It is very difficult for us to follow up, due to the fact that I have not been to China, or no one has been to China now for more than one year, and it is very difficult to communicate with our partner in China, and we get limited insight in their activity. What we know is that we know the production levels. We know that we have a very high-quality FBR product produced. In fact, we have also received some of these products here in the U.S., and we also see that we have achieved the design capacities for this facility.
Due to the fact that we have limited insight and influence, we have decided to write down our investment in China to zero, and James will cover that in more detail. Okay, I hand over to James for the financial update.
Thank you. Good morning. Total revenues for the fourth quarter were $36 million, which represents an increase of approximately 19% compared to $30.3 million in the prior quarter. This increase in revenues, as Tore indicated, can be attributed to strong sales performance in the Semiconductor Materials segment, which I'll discuss in a little more detail in a few moments. Total EBITDA for the quarter was $1.9 million, compared to $17.9 million for the third quarter. Recall that during the third quarter, the results included a $16 million non-cash adjustment due to the settlement of the property tax dispute, which leaves $1.9 million of clean EBITDA in the third quarter, which is the same as the EBITDA that we're reporting for the fourth quarter. This represents the fourth straight quarter of positive EBITDA the company has reported and results in a positive EBITDA of $23.8 million for the full year.
This was achieved in spite of a very challenging business environment and was a result of reduced spending in the solar materials segment and, more importantly, due to continued strong results in the semiconductor materials segment, which is highlighted on the next slide. Next slide. As you can see, revenues in the semiconductor materials segment have increased steadily throughout the year from a low in the first quarter, due to seasonality and uncertainty caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, to $35.9 million in the current quarter. This increase in revenues compared to the third quarter is a result of higher sales volumes of both silicon gases and semiconductor-grade polysilicon. While total polysilicon sales volumes within the segment decreased from 401 metric tons during the third quarter to 338 metric tons in the fourth quarter, sales volumes of the semiconductor grades of polysilicon increased from 174 to 250 metric tons.
This resulted in an overall increase of 37% in polysilicon revenues compared to the prior quarter. Overall average prices for polysilicon sold increased substantially due to a high mix of semiconductor polysilicon compared to volumes of solar grade polysilicon. Average prices for semiconductor grade polysilicon declined slightly due to mix as well. However, prices within the specific grades of semiconductor polysilicon increased from 5% to 15% during the quarter and compared to last quarter. Silicon gas sales volumes increased from 746 metric tons to 881 metric tons, while average silane prices declined by 2.8%. EBITDA contributed by the Semiconductor Materials Segment was $11.7 million for the fourth quarter, compared to $7.3 in the prior quarter. As I've already indicated, the increase in earnings can be attributed to higher sales volumes. Next slide. Revenues within the Solar Materials Segment were $100,000 and represented small sales from the remaining granular polysilicon inventories.
EBITDA contributed by the Solar Materials Segment was a net expense of $2.8 million, which is in line with prior quarters, excluding items of other income, such as the $16 million that we've already discussed that occurred in the third quarter within this segment. Other than eliminations were a net cost of $7 million and were $3 million higher than the previous quarter due to changes in estimates to arrive at accrued liabilities at year-end. Next slide. Cash balances, as Tore indicated, increased by $99 million during the quarter. As we've indicated, the main reason behind this large increase is the private placement of equity that was completed in October.
However, cash outflows from operations were $2.8 million and consisted of inflows of $1.9 million from EBITDA, $400,000 from a decrease in working capital invested, and these were offset by interest payments of $8.5 million and a $1.1 million contribution to the defined benefit pension plan in the United States. In addition, we've benefited from a currency gain of approximately $4.6 million due to the impact of a weaker U.S. dollar relative to the NOK on large cash balances denominated in NOK following the private placement. The majority of these proceeds from the private placement have since been converted to U.S. dollars to solidify this gain in terms of U.S. dollars. Cash outflows from investing activities were $800,000 and consisted of capital expenditures of $400,000 and an increase in restricted cash balances of $400,000. Cash flows from financing activities were $102 million.
This was the private placement of $105 million, offset by payments of the lease liabilities of $500,000 and the payment of principal on the property tax note of $2.8 million. Total cash balances increased by $99 million to a balance of $134.9 million on December 31st of 2020. Next slide. Nominal debt decreased by $800,000 during the quarter to $220.6 million. Change in nominal debt is due to a $400,000 repayment of lease liabilities. Recall that on the last slide, I said there was a $500,000 change. There was also an increase in lease liabilities due to modifications of leases. The $2.8 million decrease in the property tax note, these were offset by a $2.3 million increase in the indemnity loan due to the change in currency. Nominal debt decreased by $99.9 million to $85.7.
This was the $800,000 change that I just discussed, plus the NOK 99 million increase in cash. With respect to the indemnification loan, claim was filed in the district court here in Norway on November 13th of 2020. REC intends to defend this cause of action, and the status and the timing of the indemnification loan continues to be subject to uncertainty. I will now yield the presentation to Kurt Levens to speak on the semiconductor materials business.
Please advance it. First, I'd like to talk about our electronic-grade polysilicon performance in Q4 of last year, what the primary drivers were for that. As had been mentioned before, the market for semiconductor devices has been tightening, and to some degree, there's been some headwinds as a result of inventory that had built previous to that in both the polysilicon and the wafer space. However, as a result of continued tightening of demand for the end-user devices, we've seen that there is starting to be higher utilization in Q1 than is what is historical. As a result, customers were preparing for operations to continue during the Lunar New Year, which gave us some buoyancy in terms of our shipments. It was, in fact, the strongest shipment quarter we've had since 2018. For 2021, the demand picture is starting to firm up.
Q1 will be seasonally lower, as it is every quarter, every year, I should say. There's strong potential for quarters to continue to improve throughout the year in terms of our shipments. In addition to that, customers are considering increased demand scenarios, which in fact are mainly geared towards the second half of the year, depending upon how long the continued tightness in the market lasts. Next. silicon gas shipments were also up in Q4. One thing to note between the silicon gas supply chain and the polysilicon supply chain is that when it's functioning normally, in the silicon gas supply chain, there's less inventory. Therefore, the response mechanism between demand signal and our ability to fulfill it is, in general, much quicker. We started to see that because semiconductor remained at a high utilization through Q4, and surprisingly, flat panel display did as well.
That had started in late Q2 and sustained through Q3, and surprised everyone by continuing on through Q4. That also gave some increase in terms of our shipments. One thing to note is just a point of the ongoing challenges that were wrought by COVID-19, that after things recovered and with COVID-19 mitigations in place, we are finding that the cycle times logistically are starting to increase on ocean freight. It's something that we're monitoring and have developed plans to mitigate any effects. Currently, Q1 is firming up to be stronger than a normal Q1 period in terms of shipments. I'd also like to point out that silicon gases, as we define them, also include several other gases that are specifically meant for advanced process nodes and integrated circuits, and the demand for these continue to increase. These are products such as DCS, MCS, Disilane.
Not only do they continue to increase to service these advanced nodes and investments, but they're increasing in share of our overall shipments as well. We expect that trend to continue over the midterm to longer term of five years, and we will need additional capacity to continue to meet our customer growth. Next. I've talked generically about our products. We always report them as electronic-grade polysilicon or semiconductor polysilicon, and silicon gas products. Well, what does that mean? Well, for us, it all starts with silane. From there, we make a solid form of silicon. Specifically, in our case, float zone polysilicon is our target. We also produce some electronic-grade high purity Czochralski or CZ silicon. Gas-wise, we sell the silane into the marketplace, as well as Disilane, which is a derivative of silane, and our purified monochlorosilane and dichlorosilane, which are intermediates in our production process.
When we talk about silicon gas products, those are silicon gas products. When we talk about polysilicon electronic-grade, those are the products. Next. How are these products applied? Our float zone polysilicon goes into float zoning. It's a process to make a single crystal ingot, and its primary target is the power semiconductor market. This is a large driver, and it's utilized in high voltage distribution systems. IGBTs or transistors for electric vehicles use high purity float zone. Valve stations for large distribution systems, on and on and on. Czochralski silicon is the workhorse of the semiconductor industry. It's used for just about every form of electronics that you would imagine that go into your computers, your smartphones. This is the traditional semiconductor wafer that then the devices are built upon.
Silane is used in chemical vapor deposition, which means that it's being deposited at very thin layers on top of the wafer in order to build the device, the microprocessor, the memory device, whatever sort of device it may be. Dichlorosilane, monochlorosilane, disilane, also used in chemical vapor deposition, primarily targeted advanced semiconductor processes, but utilized in some standard semiconductor processes as well. Next. Also, I just thought it would be good to show you where our products are used in the entire semiconductor value chain. This is a very simple illustration, but our polysilicon is used in the front end to make the ingots that the wafers come out of. The wafers are then utilized on the front end of the fab, where they build the device, and that's where they use the gases in a deposition.
It's successive steps of lithography, etching, deposition, repeat, repeat as they build these transistors or other sort of devices, as is required by the integrated circuit. Next. A little bit about where we are right now and how that translates to the midterm for us. First, the chart on the left demonstrates quarterly IC unit volume shipment, and you can see that it reached a high back in Q3 of 2018, at which point it started steadily down. This is what the headwind we've been fighting for the past two years, is that it went down, and then before it was able to tighten up, we had to go through COVID. Now it's returned to a trend line that is portraying the potential for continued growth over the next few years. This is just where we're at right now for this year. What's driving that?
Aside from the issues around the temporary supply situation and then the COVID-related situation, it's about content in electronic systems. Semiconductor content in electronic systems has grown and is forecasted to continue to grow. What that translates into on the next slide, next, is that overall, semiconductor unit growth is expected to grow 6% compounded annually growth rate over the next five years. Semiconductor unit growth is primarily driven by wafer throughputs. Yes, there's other factors as well, but wafer throughputs are easily more than 80% of the driving factor. What this means is that the more wafers that go through the process, the more polysilicon they need to make those wafers, the more wafer starts there are, the more deposition there is on those wafers. It drives both parts of that business for us. Next.
How we've worked to make sure that we're aligned to be able to take care and to take a good, strong position going into this growth curve, has been to make sure that we are supplying the top manufacturers in the semiconductor industry. 100% of the top 15 are supplied by us with our gases. Why that's important is because in the industry now, the largest capacities and the largest investments in new capacities are coming from the concentrated players at the top. In addition to that, investment in new advanced processes are also coming from the players at top. Our alignment with them is key. Next. On top of that, no matter where they locate, we have the ability to supply them.
If you looked at over on the far left, when you see these regions by installed capacity, we have number one market share to supply silane in all the regions except for one. In that region, we're number two. Next. I mentioned about advanced semiconductor processes as well, this is what's driving those other gases in our portfolio. It also drives silane in the advanced semiconductor processes. Some of them, silane is used up to 30% more per square inch of silicon than it is in more traditional processes. More importantly, on our other gases, dichlorosilane, monochlorosilane, Disilane, that growth is driven by adoption of advanced processes. When you look at the future, over the next five years, the movement towards advanced processes, those nodes that are 20 nanometers and less, is going to be greater than the growth for the traditional processes.
We've positioned ourselves with the right customers, we're in the right areas, and we have the right portfolio to take advantage of this.
Thank you.
Next. Thank you, Kurt. We move over to the solar market, and Francine will start out, and then Chuck will continue.
Good morning, everyone. The most significant development in relation to the outside of China solar value chain, in the last months has been the election of the Biden administration, who has been elected on a policy platform of green energy transformation. Biden campaigned heavily on decarbonization of the economy and deployment of significant amounts of renewable energy, including solar. Biden also has heavily emphasized repeatedly the importance of Buy America and has recently taken action in that regard, and on the importance of creating high-paying domestic manufacturing jobs. Biden's people and himself are talking about making things in America this time. This point was emphasized recently by the new head of the Department of Energy in the U.S., who repeatedly talked about making solar panels and other elements of renewable energy in the U.S. We don't have specific policies yet. They're still under development.
The administration is still getting into place. Senate confirmation hearings are ongoing, as are political appointments. Discussions are ongoing in relation to how those policies should look, and we expect them to form part of future stimulus packages, which are anticipated to come out within the next year. With the election of the Biden administration, we have both the U.S. and Europe, two of the world's major economies, set to take action to support renewables and to support a domestic supply chain in relation to renewables. This is very positive towards the outside of China solar value chain. Alongside this, there is a growing focus on the importance of sustainability in the solar supply chain, and this is coming from both buyers and developers.
Companies that are buying solar panels are looking to reduce their scope 3 emissions, and one very effective way to do that is to buy solar panels with a low carbon footprint. We're also seeing the growth and strengthening of the Ultra Low-Carbon Solar Alliance, which is a group of outside of China manufacturers who are all prioritizing green energy processes and reduction of carbon in their production processes. It has been very effective at amplifying the fact that there is an alternative solar value chain available, and that those looking to reduce scope 3 emissions should be looking to procure from this supply chain. With that, I'll hand it over to Chuck.
Next slide. Good morning. Going into more detail on the PV market outlook, you can see on the chart on the right that installation forecasts are projected to continue their strong trajectory and growth. Looking at 2020, the first set of bars, while all the numbers have not been finalized, it appears that even with the COVID-19 impact, it was another record year for total installations. With several climate announcements in 2020, both from countries and from global companies, the forecast for solar installations continue to be pushed up. In the past quarter, we've seen market analysts increase installation forecasts between 30-60 GW over the next few years. China is expected increased installations over the next several years, with 2021 projected in the range of 55-58 GW. The U.S. saw a record installation in 2020 with around 18-19 GW installed.
The investment tax credit extension will increase installation rates in the U.S. I'll cover that in the next slide. Europe also had a good year in 2020, with countries like Germany and Spain having strong installation numbers. With a low-carbon focus in Europe, it's expected that installations will be 25-30 GW in 2021, then average around 30 GW in the following years. In the rest of the world, India was down in 2020 is expected to recover in 2021 as part of their COVID-19 stimulus work. Several smaller countries are increasing just from a few megawatts to hundreds of megawatts. All that is adding more. More countries are joining at the gigawatt annual installation levels. While China is increasing installations, the demand outside of China continues to grow, with the U.S. and Europe running about 50 GW annually installed going forward.
Now, looking at this growing market, along with the low carbon desires, the desires for shorter supply chain, there is growing support for an outside China value chain. Next slide. Focusing on the U.S. market, we can again look at this chart on the right. The small red line shows where the forecast for 2021 through 2023 was before the ITC extension was passed. The results of that passing was a jump in forecasted installations for this three-year time period. Before the installation, forecast was very flat going forward. Now the overall effect is about an additional 15 GW due to the ITC extension. Farther out forecasts have the utility market declining once the ITC expires, but expectation is that more support will come.
The Biden administration has already signaled their support for renewables with the presidential executive order that gives directives on a clean energy purchases for the government facilities, and leveraging the government buying power to support the president's Build Back Better jobs. The executive order also leads to further support, such as the establishment of the White House Office of Domestic Climate Policy, led by the National Climate Advisor, which is a new position in the administration. We believe further increases in the forecast for the U.S. will be made going forward. Next slide. Here we look at the PV pricing for the past year. With the chart on the right, you can see the impacts of the COVID-19 with the price declines in Q2 of 2020. In Q3, we see the sharp increase due to some incidents at China polysilicon plants.
Prices stabilized in Q4 as those plants recovered. Prices started to rise again as demand increased going into 2021, and it continues to increase. With the higher installation forecast, along with the expected expansions of the ingot wafer cell and module capacity, we expect the market for polysilicon to remain tight and balanced for this year and potentially next. The pricing movements throughout 2020 and leading into 2021 support the investment need for supply expansion of high-quality polysilicon. There are plants outside of China available to support that now. With that, I will hand it back over to Tore.
Thank you, Chuck. To give you a short update on the Yulin JV. Next. You know all the characteristics for this. This is a state-of-the-art FBR facility, 19,000 metric ton FBR-B granular, 300 metric ton Siemens, and 500 metric ton of silane. As I said in my first presentation, we are, let's say over the last 12 months, have had limited insight in what's going on on this JV. The fact that we had to take all our American specialists back to the U.S. in January last year. All the communication issues we have sitting in the U.S. talking to our colleagues, our JV partner in China, has meant that we have limited insight, but also it has limited how much assistance we can give to them, and they still need a lot of assistance from our specialists here in the U.S.
It has also been some dispute over the payment. We decided not to make the payment of $4.7, which was due by the end of 2020. The reason why was that there was outstanding invoices from our side, which was not paid by the Yulin JV, mainly for the technical assistance we then give them from the U.S. To be then, accounting-wise, on the right side, we basically have decided to write down our investment in Yulin to zero. It is also based upon the fact that there is, let's say, the operations of this plant is not according to standard. We are operating less than half capacity, and it just show that, let's say they need a lot of assistance to be able to do a tremendous or an operation which is on an excellent level.
As I said, it is very limited what we can do from the U.S. Also we see that they accumulate debt, supported by their company, Youser Group, which is then the 85% owner of the plant. That's why we have written it down. It doesn't mean that we definitely would like to continue to be a partner over there. Hopefully it will be improved opportunities now in 2021, so we can start to send our specialists over again to help out on the operations side in Yulin. Then we have given the numbers for Q4. The interesting thing is at least that, in Q4, they made more FBR granular than what they have done in any previous quarter. Also the quality is a high standard quality, which is now used by the largest mono wafer companies in China. Next.
I will hand over to Francine again to discuss the battery opportunities we are working with.
Okay, the electrification transition is really picking up pace across the global economy. We're seeing momentum in all aspects of the battery and EV industry. This has really picked up in the last couple of months. It's not just new entrants into the EV space these days. We've seen some major moves by the incumbent automakers, even in recent weeks. Ford announced a couple of weeks ago it would really ramp up its EV investment significantly. GM, of course, has announced that it will be all electric by 2035. These are really big moves and really important for the electrification transition and the move to EVs in the global economy.
Alongside this, the Biden administration has emphasized the importance of EVs in its decarbonization goals, of course, the importance of a domestic battery supply chain for making those EVs and the important components. We're also seeing significant investor interest across the EV and battery sectors. The relevance of all this for REC Silicon, silane is a next generation battery material, silane is the preferred source of silicon for next generation silicon anodes. Next generation silicon anodes using silane are achieving 20%-30% increased performance, some are even achieving a 50% increased performance within time. These batteries containing silicon anodes are much better value than batteries containing traditional anode material, which is graphite. Specifically, the advantages of silicon anodes are improved energy density, they reduce battery weight and cost, they unlock currently redundant or unused cathode capacity.
They increase the power acceptance of batteries, allowing faster charge and longer range. Advanced silicon anode materials containing silane are also a drop-in solution to replace graphite. There's no need for major changes in manufacturing for battery makers to start using these kind of materials, which is very important for market acceptance. Next slide, please. We are continuing our cooperation with Group14. We have the MoU in place, as you know, and G14 is without a doubt a silicon anode leader. G14 is planning the first commercial scale silicon anode manufacturing plant globally, and it plans to build this 12,000 metric ton plant co-located with REC's facility in Moses Lake. The plant is expected to break ground in 2021, and REC Silicon will supply silane via pipeline to this facility and will work together with Group14 to develop the pipeline infrastructure.
Currently, Group14 has a pilot plant installation underway in our facility in Moses Lake. Group14 anticipates entry into the EV market in 2023, and that its material will overtake less sophisticated but the currently prevalent silicon anode material by 2024. Next slide, please. REC is very well positioned to supply the growing silicon anode market globally. We are currently supplying silane to several of the leading players in addition to G14, and we are having continuing discussions with these players in relation to ramping up supply in the future. Large quantities of silane are forecasted for battery and EV demands over the coming years, and as these companies scale up production, it simply will not be practical or economic to use silane in cylinders or in containers. It will be necessary for companies to co-locate with silane production.
The reason for this is that the current silane distribution network or available container capacity is only around 7,000 metric tons. In order to scale up or to increase that capacity, it is very expensive. It's about $30 million for 1,000 metric tons. Additionally, reliance on containers requires substantial OPEX on the part of the user. This OPEX would relate to loading of modules and maintenance, as well as freight and logistics. We do anticipate supplying companies that are focused in this space through co-location in future, and the diagram shows how a co-location would work with REC. Thank you. With that, I'll hand over to Tore.
Thank you, Francine. Next. Basically, we feel that REC is well-positioned in this energy transition. The core feedstock for doing this is our silane. Silane is the purest silicon you can get. It is a SiH4, it's only silicon and hydrogen. We are using this silane today in the semiconductor market. As you know, we are by far the largest silicon gas provider to the semiconductor industry. 70% of the market is covered on a global basis from Butte, 3,200 metric ton is what we have delivered this year. Definitely, we are a leader on delivering silane to semiconductor. Silane is also the feedstock for our high-purity float-zone polysilicon, which is the purest polysilicon used in semiconductor, there is only one competitor to that purity on a global basis.
Butte is doing well, very well in the semiconductor industry. We also have some investment opportunities, which will be hopefully achieved or done during 2021, which will further improve our competitiveness in the semiconductor market. A stable EBITDA around $35 million in 2020, we, as Kurt said, we are very optimistic concerning the semiconductor market in not only the short term but also on the long term. Silane is also used for making polysilicon for the solar market. Unfortunately, due to this trade war between China, we have been shut down now for 18 months because there is no customer for our solar production outside of China. Since we have a duty today, which is 57% plus 25%, there is no way we can get access to the Chinese market. Hopefully, that will change.
The new administration here in the U.S. is presently reviewing their political, let's say, situation with China. It is definitely on hold for the moment, but we don't know if Phase I, which was signed with President Trump a year ago, still will be in place or if the Biden administration will change their view on what the opportunity to find a solution with China on this trade war. In Moses Lake, we do have 18,000 metric tons of capacity. It's not a large capacity compared to the global demand, which is now approximately 500,000 to 550,000 metric tons. As you saw from Chuck's presentation, the polysilicon price in China now is $12 a Kg. If we were able to get access, we would have a profitable production out of Moses Lake from the FBR.
As you know, FBR is a very efficient way of making polysilicon, but you need silane. You can't use other feedstocks if you would like to do FBR. An alternative, if there is going to be built new polysilicon capacity outside of China, we still have the IP for the FBR technology everywhere else than in China. Remember, this technology was back in 2014, the Chinese paid $200 million to get access to our technology. Solar is very attractive. It seems that there will be a tremendous growth in solar, and that means it needs to be built new capacity. We are now then working on this non-Chinese value chain as an alternative to an open up between China and U.S., and we can get access to the Chinese market. The new thing coming up is definitely the batteries.
Let's say it is very attractive what these batteries companies are telling us. You might improve the efficiency of the batteries by 20% to 40% by adding silicon to the anode side compared to graphite, which is in all batteries as of today. Moses Lake, we have 25,000 metric ton of silane. We are the only one having silane capacity outside of China. Either you come to Moses Lake or you have to go to China to get silane. As Francine said, we have several battery companies competing and discussing with REC to get access to this silane. Definitely we are in a very good position since we already have invested $1.7 billion to build our silane and FBR capacity, and all this capacity is today idle.
Also what Francine said, let's say these companies need to be co-located with where you make the silane because it's very, very expensive to move or logistically to move large quantity of silane. We feel that we have, in fact, three very attractive markets we are working on, and the silane is definitely the enabler for these three markets. Next. What we focus on this quarter in REC Silicon, definitely we have a much better financial position since we were able to get then this NOK 1 billion from our investors. We are now looking into and to make these opportunities to invest in new business opportunities, mainly in Butte on the semiconductor side.
This market, particularly within silicon gas, we are not able to deliver what is the demand out there. We didn't have the money to do these investments. We can do these investments, which then will improve further the opportunities in the semiconductor market. We also will have to do some investments in Moses Lake if we decide to go into the solar PV market with mono-capable polysilicon. Besides that, we are working a lot to develop this non-Chinese PV value chain. We also have said we are talking to these silicon anode companies, and definitely we are working with the politicians to see if we can get this trade war with China out of the way so we can get access to Chinese wafer companies.
That's the focus on the strategic level in REC, and definitely the most important thing is to have good operations out of our Butte facility and to find ways that we can open up Moses Lake in a profitable way within the shortest time possible. Thank you so much for listening in, and then we have some time to answer questions. I don't know if, Nils, are you going to select the questions we have gotten?
I can do that, Tore.
Okay. James.
First question is, how do you see future market opportunities for REC? Will the increase be towards the battery industry or towards the PV market?
That's what we, let's say, are looking into. As we said, we have 25,000 metric tons of capacity. What I foresee, definitely the battery market will be very attractive. According to these battery companies, we will have enough capacity to support approximately 2 million electric cars. It depends how fast these new batteries will be developed and be then used in the EV industry. At the same time, there is a lot of attractiveness also on the non-Chinese, low-carbon footprint solar market. Solar is mainly used for reducing the CO2 emission, and it doesn't make sense to, let's say, buy solar panels, which has been built by using coal-fired power, and that's where we can compete with Chinese panel makers if focus will be to reduce the CO2 carbon footprint.
We are following both opportunities, and then we will see what is the most attractive from an economic point of view in REC Silicon.
Okay. The next question is, what can you say about the Moses Lake facility, the current situation there, especially with respect to the decision to reopen the facility?
As I said, Moses Lake has been now, let's say, idle for approximately 18 months. We have previously informed that we are working towards a 2023 restart. That is still our, let's say, goal. We need to find customers. We need to see that it will be a profitable startup. Our goal will be to be back in operations in 2023.
Okay. Related to that question, will the Moses Lake facility be able to produce mono-grade polysilicon?
Yes. We know that that will be possible because that's what we do now in China with our technology. There will be a need for some modifications as we have already informed about, it is highly capable to produce mono quality and at a substantially less carbon footprint and a lower cost than all our competitors outside of China.
Next question is, can you comment on the recently announced changes in the board of directors and the involvement in the new board members?
I think that's not to me to comment on. I look forward to work with the new board if they are going to be elected on March 4th. I have had, or we have had a very good relationship with the board, or the different boards we have had, and we look forward to work with also the new board.
Okay. We've got five minutes left, so this will be the last question. Is the board discussing any strategy to go all in on producing products for batteries? What's the current status on Violet Power?
I think I already answered this. We are looking into both the opportunities in the battery segment, but also at the same time, we are looking into the solar market and the low carbon footprint market. As I tried to explain, we have a strategy to see if we can put together a portfolio for Moses Lake, which is generating the best return on our investment in Moses Lake. The priority will be to do that as fast as we can. We are dependent upon that we have firm contracts, either on the PV side or on the battery side, for as much volume of silicon as possible. Okay. That was the questions. Thank you so much for attending this presentation, and have a good day over in Europe. Now it is midnight, or it is in Moses Lake. Thank you.