Michigan is an unlikely home for a solar powerhouse, but in early February 2009, when the Dow Corning Corporation announced it had produced double-digit increases in revenue in 2008, the company credited the Hemlock Semiconductor Group, its solar energy materials unit, for much of the good news.
Since it was formed in 1961, Hemlock Semiconductor has manufactured polycrystalline silicon, the basic raw material that powered the computer chip industry. In 2002, as global interest grew in generating solar energy from photovoltaic cells, the company began providing greater amounts of “solar grade” polycrystalline silicon to solar cell and module manufacturers.