Philips Semiconductors policy and strategy to reduce globalwarming by PFC emissions

摘要

Perfluorinated compounds (PFC's) emissions contribute largely to global warming caused by the semiconductor (SC) industry.Typically,PFC's are long-lived and strongly absorbIR radiation.Moreover,the PFC use by the global semiconductor industry increases rapidly and the estimated PFC consumption in 2010 will be 7-10 times higher than in 1995.In that perspective,the European semiconductor industry has agreed to reduce global warming by PFC’s with10% in 2010 relative to the 1995 baseline,as laid down in the voluntary Memorandum ofAgreement (MOA).This corresponds with more than c.90% reduction on the basis of the estimatedPFC use in 2010.In comparison with mainstream device manufacturers,Philips Semiconductors has awide product portfolio.The large variety of other than standard,typical product andprocess requirements,of product and process mixes and of machines,makes this reductiontarget an even tougher challenge.In order to achieve these highly ambitious targets,Philips Semiconductors has drawn upa PFC emissions reduction roadmap.This roadmap comprises studies of possible solutions,as well as implementation strategies.Possible solutions being examined includeprocess optimizations (reduction of PFC consumption in connection with lower emissions),developments of alternative processes (based on substitutes with lower GWP thusallowing lower global warming impact) and evaluations of downstream abatement options(destruction of PFC compounds in gaseous effluent streams).In this presentation the roadmap and the organization to realize the ambitions will be explained.Potential problems,which may arise when PFC emission reducing measures areimplemented in an existing production setting,are discussed.