Air Liquide will spend nearly €200 million to build new capacity for industrial gases in Taiwan, supplying three high-volume semiconductor fabrication plants that are currently under construction.

The French industrial gases group has secured a long-term contract with an unnamed “semiconductor market leader” to build the plants in the Science Parks of Tainan and Hsinchu, respectively located in the south and north of the country.

Through its majority owned joint venture Air Liquide Far Eastern, the company will build, own and operate ultra-high-purity hydrogen and oxygen plants in both locations with a total capacity of 5,000 Nm³/hr hydrogen plus two large-scale plants in Hsinchu to produce nitrogen and argon, giving an additional capacity of 120,000 Nm³/hr high-purity nitrogen. Air Liquide will also supply large volumes of helium.

The first plants are expected to start operations during the second quarter of 2021.

The hydrogen will be partially produced from renewable energy sources, avoiding the emission of an estimated 20,000 t/y of CO₂, Air Liquide said. The group added that it has been working with the semiconductor industry in Taiwan and Asia for more than 30 years.

In separate news, the Paris-based gases producer said it has signed 11 new on-site contracts with industrial merchant customers during the first quarter of 2020. The company added that this follows a record year in 2019, when it signed 40 new long-term on-site agreements.

The latest agreements cover the supply of nitrogen, oxygen or hydrogen for a minimum of 10 years. These units are installed, operated and maintained directly at customer sites, removing the need to liquefy and transport the gases, reducing companies’ carbon footprints.

Air Liquide said it has seen a steady increase in the number of on-site installations during the past five years, with recent growth driven in particular by China and the US through its Airgas subsidiary. In the first quarter of 2020, the company signed its 40^th on-site contract in the US since it acquired Airgas in 2016.

The gases group is currently negotiating with separate private equity firms for the divestment of its Cryopdp and Schülke & May subsidiaries. In early March, Air Liquide announced it had entered into exclusive negotiations with French investor Hivest Capital Partners for the sale of Cryopdp, which provides temperature-controlled logistics services to the clinical research and cell & gene therapy sectors.

In April, the company confirmed it had begun talks with EQT on selling Schülke & Mayr, a provider of disinfectants, wound antisepsis products and specialty additives for personal care.