TSMC, the world's largest semiconductor manufacturer, conducted an emergency drill this week to prepare its employees to battle wind and rain. The current water shortage plaguing Taiwan could severely hurt production at the leading manufacturer's foundry.

TSMC is a monster wafer company that caters to all the top players, including Intel, AMD, Apple, Samsung, and Nvidia. With high demand pushing the company to meet the needs of its customers, the company is undoubtedly using a lot of water and energy to do so.

According to local sources (via ComputerBase), the Tainan area, where the company's two gigafabs, a small wafer fabrication plant, and an advanced back-end plant are located, will be under an orange alert starting tomorrow. This is the second highest alert level and TSMC must act quickly if the drought begins to affect production.

More precisely, an Orange Alert means the deployment of initial water distribution measures that limit "total water use and water supply reductions," while a Red Alert means that "water supplies will only be available in certain areas during certain times of the day."

Thankfully, Vanguard International Semiconductor Corporation (VIS) and United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC) arranged for emergency water tankers to TSMC to alleviate stress during the Red Alert The company has been working on this project since last week. Emergency maneuvering tests have been conducted for the past week, but it is not noted whether the tests were successful.

Hopefully, the company's planned expansion to the US, Japan, and other parts of the world will be more stable. Diversifying resources is the best way to prevent a looming catastrophe.