Good morning, and welcome to the presentation of the Q4 for REC Silicon. We are all today, I'm Tore Torvand, the President and CEO ORIC Silicon. And we are all today in the US. 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. So let me start. Let's say I will present the highlights. James May Financial Reviews. Can you go back one?
Kurt Levins, responsible for our Butte operations. Wiltek Silicone Gas. Francine, Southern 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 Maxten. The highlights for Q4, we had a revenue of 36 $1,000,000 and a positive EBITDA of 1.9.
The cash balance is today, €124,900,000,000 And we have a cash increase of €99,000,000 mainly due to the private placement of NOK 1,000,000,000, which was done in October. Any cash outflow from operating activities was $2,800,000 The very positive development we see on the silane silicon gas volume. It was 881 metric ton compared to 746 in Q3 and this is one of the strongest quarter we have on silicon gas. I'm Kurt Levins. We'll cover all the details there.
A minor reduction in the gas price of 2.8%. Also on the polysilicon side, we are very satisfied with the numbers and we sold 250 metric tonne of high quality polysilicon to the semiconductor Industry. I think we have already covered the private placement of equity in October, but 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 in the U. S.
But we see now that there is definitely a very good balance between the demand and supply of polysilicon and 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. And as you remember, we have an MoU with the G14 and Francine will also cover this part of it. On the Uline JV, we have decided to write down the investment 0 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 a year and it is very difficult to communicate with 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. But due to the fact that we have limited insight and influence, we have decided to write down our investment in China, 2 0, and James will cover that in more detail. Gabe. Then I hand over to James for the financial update.
Thanks. Good morning. Total revenues for the Q4 were $36,000,000 which represents an increase of approximately 19% compared to $30,300,000 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 to quarter was CAD1.9 million compared to CAD17.9 million for the 3rd quarter.
Recall that during the Q3, the results included a $16,000,000 noncash adjustment due to the settlement of the property tax dispute, Which leaves €1,900,000 of clean EBITDA in the 3rd quarter, which is the same as the EBITDA that we're reporting for the 4th quarter. This represents the 4th straight quarter of positive EBITDA the company has reported and results in a positive EBITDA of €23,800,000 for the full year. So it 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. As you can see, revenues in the Semiconductor Materials segment have increased steadily throughout the year from a low in the Q1 due to seasonality and uncertainty caused by the COVID-nineteen pandemic to $35,900,000 in the current quarter. Same increase in revenues compared to the 3rd quarter as a result of higher sales volumes of both silicon gases and semiconductor grade polysilicon.
While total polysilicon sales volumes within the segment decreased from 4 100 metric 401 metric tonnes during the 3rd quarter to 3 38 metric tonnes in the 4th quarter. Sales volumes of the semiconductor grades of polysilicon increased from 174 to 250 metric tonnes. 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 Duda 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 tonnes to 881 metric tonnes, while average silane prices declined from 2.8 by 2.8%. EBITDA contributed by the Semiconductor Materials segment was $11,700,000 for the 4th quarter compared to $7,300,000 in the prior quarter. So 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 2,800,000 which is in line with prior quarters excluding items of other income such as the $16,000,000 that we've already discussed that occurred in the 3rd quarter within this segment. Other eliminations were a net cost of $7,000,000 and were $3,000,000 higher than the previous quarter due to changes in estimates to arrive accrued liabilities at year end. Next slide. Cash balances, as Tore indicated, increased by $99,000,000 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. Our cash flows from operations cash outflows from operations were $2,800,000 and consisted of inflows of $1,900,000 from EBITDA, dollars 400,000 from a decrease in working capital invested, and these were offset by interest payments of 8,500,000 kind of $1,100,000 contribution to the defined benefit pension plan in the United States. In addition, we've benefited from a currency gain of approximately $4,600,000 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 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 102,000,000 this was the private placement of NOK 105,000,000 offset by payments of the lease liabilities of NOK 500,000 and the payment of principal on the property tax note of $2,800,000 Total cash balances increased by $99,000,000 a balance of €134,900,000 on December 31, 2020. Next slide. Nominal debt decreased by $800,000 during the quarter to 220,600,000 change in nominal debt is due to $400,000 repayment of lease liabilities. Recall that on the last slide, I said there was $500,000 change. There was also an increase in lease liabilities due to modifications of leases, the $2,800,000 decrease in the property tax note, and these were offset by a $2,300,000 increase in the indemnity loan due to the change in currency.
Nominal debt decreased by CAD 99,900,000 to CAD 85,700,000 This was the CAD 800,000 change that I just discussed, plus the $99,000,000 increase in cash. With respect to the indemnification loan, claim was filed in the district court here in Norway on November 13, 2020. RNC intends to defend this cause of action And the status and the timing of the indemnification loan continues to be subject to uncertainty. I'll now yield the presentation to Kurt Levins to speak on the Semiconductor Materials Business.
Okay, please advance it. So 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.
That is what is historical. And as a result, customers 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.
Ann. 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 our mainly geared towards the second half of the year depending upon how long the continued tightness in the market LAS. 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. So therefore, the response mechanism between demand signal and our ability to fulfill it is, in general much quicker. And we started to see that because semiconductor remained at a high utilization through Q4 And surprisingly flat panel displayed it as well that it started in Q3. It had started in late Q2 and sustained through Q3 and surprised everyone by continuing on through Q4. So 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 that after things recovered and with COVID 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 then a normal Q1 period in terms of shipments. I'd also like to point out that silicon gases as we define them also includes several other gases that are specifically met for advanced process nodes and integrated circuits and the demand for these continue to increase. These are products such as DCS, MCS, Disilane.
And they not only do they continue to increase To service these advanced nodes and investments, but they're an increasing in share of our overall shipments as well. We expect that trend to continue over the midterm to longer term of 5 years. And we will need additional capacity To continue to meet our customer growth. Next. So 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 ciolkowski or CZ silicon. Gas wise, we sell the silane into the marketplace as well as disilane, which is the derivative of silane Anar purified monochlorosilane and dichlorosilane, which are intermediates in our production process. So when we talk about silicon gas products, those are silicon gas products. When we talk about polysilicon electronic grade, those are the products. Next.
And how are these products applied? Well, 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 utilized in high voltage distribution systems, IGBTs or transistors for electric vehicles use high purity float zone valve stations 4 large distribution systems and on and on and on.
Ciolchowalski silicon is the 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 is which means that It's being deposited at very thin layers on top of the wafer in order to build the device, the microprocessor of 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.
So 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, repeat as they build these transistors or other sort of devices as is required by the integrated circuit.
Next. So 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. And this is what the headwind we've been fighting for the past 2 years is that it went down.
And then before it was able to tighten up, we had to go through COVID. Now its return to a trend line that is portraying the potential for continued growth over the next few years. But 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. So what that translates into on the next slide, next, Is that overall semiconductor unit growth It's expected to grow 6% compounded annually growth rate over the next 5 years. And semiconductor unit growth is primarily driven by wafer throughputs. Yes, there's other factors as well. But wafer foot throughputs are easily more than 80% of the driving factor.
And 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. So 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.
All of the 100 percent of the top 15 are supplied by us with our gases. And 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. So our alignment with them is key. Next.
And 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 1. And in that region, we're number 2. Next. I mentioned about advanced semiconductor processes as well and this is what's driving those other gases in our portfolio.
It also drives silane in the advanced semiconductor processes. Some some of them. Silane is used up to 30% more per square inch of silicon than it is in more traditional processes. But more importantly, on our other gases, dichlorosilane, monochlorosiladeisilane, debt growth is driven by adoption of advanced processes. And when you look at the future over the next 5 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.
So 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. Then we move over to the solar market and Francine will start out and then Chuck will continue.
Good morning, everyone. So the most significant development in relation to the outside of China's 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 size 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 at this time.
This point was emphasized recently by the new Head of the Department of Energy in the United States, who repeatedly talked about making solar panels and other elements of renewable energy in the United States. 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.
The discussions are ongoing in relation to how those policies are look should look, and we expect them to form part of future stimulus packages, which are anticipated to come out within the next year. So with the election the Biden administration. We have both the U. S. And Europe, 2 of the world's major economies, set to take action to support renewables and to support our domestic supply chain in relation to renewables.
And 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 DASCO3 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 outside of China manufacturers who are all prioritizing green energy processes And reduction of carbon in their production processes.
And it has been very effective at amplifying the fact that there are there is an alternative solar value chain available and that those looking to reduce Scope 3 emissions should we 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 growth. Looking at 2020, the first set of bars, While all the numbers have not been finalized, it appears that even with the COVID-nineteen 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 increased installation forecast between 30 to 60 gigawatts over the next few years. China is expected to increase installations over the next several years with 2021 projected in the range of 55 gigawatts to 58 gigawatts. The U.
S. Saw record installation in 2020 with around 18 to 19 gigawatts installed. The investment tax credit extension the increased installation rates in the U. S. And I'll cover that in the next slide.
Europe also had a good year in 2020 with countries like Germany and having strong installation numbers. With a low carbon focus in Europe, it's expected that installations will be 25 to 30 gigawatts 2021 and then average around 30 gigawatts in the following years. In the rest of the world, India was down in 2020 but is expected to recover in 2021 as part of their COVID stimulus work. Several smaller countries are increasing just from a few megawatts to 100 of megawatts and all that is adding more. And then 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 gigawatts annually installed going forward. 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 3 year time period.
Before the installation forecast was very flat going forward. Now the overall effect is about an additional 15 gigawatts due to the ITC extension. The farther out forecast have the utility market declining once the ITC expires, the 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 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-nineteen with the price declines in Q2 of 2020. Then in Q3, we see the sharp increase due to some incidents at China polysilicon plants. Prices then stabilized in Q4 as those plants recovered, then 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 Salem 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. And with that, I will hand it back over to Thor.
Thank you, Chuck. Then 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 FBRB granular, 300 metric ton of Siemens and 500 metric ton of silane. The, as I said in my first presentation, we are, let's say, over the last 12 months, I've 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 as meant that we have limited insight, but also it is limited how much assistance we can give to them and I 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 SEK4.7 billion, which was due by the end of 2020. And the reason why was that there was outstanding invoices from our side, which was not paid by the Ulan JV, mainly for the technical assistance we then give them from the U.
S. And to be then on the the accounting wise on the right side. We basically have decided to write down our investments in in Yulin to 0. 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 showed that they say they need a lot of assistance to be able to do a tremendous or an operation which is on an excellent level.
And as I said, we it is very limited what we can do from the U. S. And also we see that they accumulate debt supported by their company, Yosu Group, which is then the 85% owner of the plant. So that's why we have written it down. It doesn't mean that we have we don't we definitely would like to continue to be a partner over there, but hopefully it will be improved opportunities now in 2021 so we can start to send our specialist over again to help out on the operations side in NewLink.
And then we have given the numbers for Q4 and the the interesting thing is at least that in Q4 they made more FBR granular than what they have done in any previous quarter. And also the quality is high standard quality, which is now used by the largest mono wafer companies in China. Next. Another hand over to Francine again to discuss the battery opportunities we are working with.
Okay. So 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, and 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 start making significant or really ramp up its EV investment significantly. And GM, of course, has announced that it will be all electric by 2,035. And these are really, really big moves and really important 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 And of course, the importance of the 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.
So the relevance of all this for REC Silicon, silane is a next generation battery material, And silane is the preferred source of silicon for next generation silicon anodes. Next generation silicon anodes using silane achieving 20% to 30% increased performance And some are even achieving a 50% increased performance within time. So these batteries because these batteries containing silicon anodes a 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 And 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. So there's no need for major changes in manufacturing For battery makers to start using these kind of materials, which is very, very important for market acceptance. Next slide, please. So we are continuing our cooperation with Group 14. We have the MoU in place, as you know, And G14 is without a doubt a silicon anode leader.
G14 is planning the 1st commercial scale silicon anode manufacturing plant globally, and it plans to build this 12,000 Metric Tonne 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 biopipeline to this facility And we'll work together with Group 14 to develop the pipeline infrastructure. Currently, Group 14 has a pilot plant installation underway at our facility in Moses Lake. Group 14 anticipates entry into the EUV market in 2023 And that its material will overtake less sophisticated, but the currently prevalent silicon anode material by 2024. 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 EVE 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 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 It's only around 1,000 metric tons. And in order to scale up or to increase that capacity.
It is very, very expensive. It's about $30,000,000 for 1,000 metric tonnes. Additionally, reliance on containers Requires substantial OpEx on the part of the user. And this OpEx would relate to loading of modules and maintenance as well as freight and logistics. So we do anticipate supplying companies that are focused in this space through colocation in future.
And the diagram shows how colocation would work with REC. Thank you. And with that, I'll hand over to Tora.
Thank you, Francine. So next. So basically we feel that RIC is well positioned in this energy transition. And the core feedstock for doing this is our silane. Silane is the purest silicon you can get.
It is a SiH4. Switzerland, silicon and hydrogen. And we are using this silane today in the semiconductor market. And as you know, we are by far the largest, let's say, silicon gas provider to the semiconductor industry. 70% of the market is covered on a global basis from Butte N3200 metric tonne is what we have delivered this year.
So definitely let's say we are a leader on on let's say delivering silane to to semiconductor. Silane is also the feedstock for our high purity float zone polysilicon, which is the purest polysilicon used on in semiconductor. And there's only one competitor to that Purity on a global basis. So Butte is doing well, very well in the semiconductor industry. We also have some investment opportunities, which will be hopefully achieved a return during 2021, which will further improve our competitiveness in the semiconductor market.
A stable EBITDA around 35,000,000 in 2020. And 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. And 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. But the new administration here in the US this present to be reviewing their political, let's say, situation with China. So it is definitely on hold for the moment, but we don't know if phase 1, which was signed with President Trump a year ago, it still will be in place or if the Biden administration will change their the review on what's the or the opportunity to find a solution with China on this trade war. In Moses Lake, we do have 18,000 metric tonne of capacity. It's not a large capacity compared to the global demand, which is now approximately 500,000 to 550,000 metric ton.
But 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. And as you know, FBR is a very efficient way on making polysilicon, but you need silane. Can't use other feedstocks if you would like to do SDR. An alternative, if there is going to be built new policy leaking capacity outside of China.
We still have the IP for the FBR technology everywhere else than in China. And remember, this technology was back in 2014. The Chinese paid $200,000,000 to get access to our technology. So 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.
So 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 U. S. To the Chinese market.
The new thing coming up is definitely the batteries. I 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. So either you come to Moses Lake or you have to go to China to get silent. As Francine said, we have several battery companies competing and discussing with REC to get access to these Poseidon. And definitely we are in a very good position since we already have invested $1,700,000,000 to build our silane NFPA capacity and all this capacity is today idle. Also what Frenzel 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 to logistically to move large quantity of silane.
So that's why you have to co locate if you would like to use large count quantities Silane. So we feel that we have in fact 3 very attractive markets we are working on and Xylem is definitely the enabler for these 3 markets. Next. And then what we focus on this quarter In REC Silicon. Definitely, we have a much better financial position since we were able to get this SEK1 billion from our investors.
And 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. So we didn't have the money to do these investments. Now we can do these investments, which then will improve further the opportunities in the CEMEX market, but 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 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. So 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.
So thank you so much for listening in. And then we have some time to answer questions. And I don't know if Nils, are you going to select the questions you have gotten?
I can do that, Thor. Okay. Yes. First question is how do you see future market opportunities for REC? Will the increase be towards the battery industry towards the PV market.
That's what we, let's say, our looking into, as we said, we have 25,000 metric ton of capacity. What I 4C. Definitely the battery market will be very attractive according to these battery companies. We will have enough capacity to support approximately 2,000,000 electric cars. And it depends how fast these new batteries will be developed and be and used in the EV Industry.
But at the same time, there is a lot of let's say solar is mainly used for reducing the CO2 emission and it doesn't make sense Dubai very 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. So 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
Zohri. As I said, Moses Lake has been idle for approximately 18 months. This is our major focus and we have previously informed that we are working towards 2023 restart. And that is still our, let's say, goal. But we need to find customers and we need to see that it will be a profitable start up, but 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 monograde polysilicon?
AES. As 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, what 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 to work with the new board, if they're going to be elected on in March 4th. So 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 5 minutes left, so this will be the last question. Is the board discussing any strategy to go all in on producing products for batteries? And 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. So as I try to explain, we have a strategy to see if we can put together a portfolio 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, but we are dependent upon that we have firm contracts either on the PV side or on the battery side for as much volume of silane as possible. Okay.
That was the questions. So 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.