It is popular for mainstream media to publicize different industry’s energy consumption and environmental habits. The semiconductor industry is not immune to this occasional finger-pointing concerning energy consumption, water consumption, and hazardous chemicals that are used to produce the chips that are ubiquitous in our daily lives.
Major publications highlight how the industry is consuming resources and tell us about the significant mountains the industry needs to climb to get to carbon neutrality. However; they also fail to acknowledge the efforts the industry is making to achieve carbon neutrality, as well as the progress that has been made over the past few years. They also fail to acknowledge that their jobs would be a lot harder without the hardware and software the industry generates for servers and electronic devices the news industry uses to get its jobs done.
It does take a lot of energy for the semiconductor industry to create chips. Growing silicon ingots require temperatures above 1400° C. Driving and activating dopants that make semiconductor chips work sometimes require hours above 1000°C.
Innovations such as rapid thermal and laser anneals have modified some of the energy required for manufacturing chips. The lasers needed for DUV and EUV take considerable amounts of energy and gases to create the patterns on chips, and the plasma processes used to create the fine lines or circuitry also use significant energy. Two of the leaders in the semiconductor industry’s sustainability effort, Intel has committed to net zero in 2040, and ST Microelectronics is anticipating carbon neutrality by 2027. Intel plans on using 100% renewables by 2030 and is currently at 93% renewables.
SEMI’s SCC
SEMI’s focus on sustainability has been gaining momentum for the past three years. The Semiconductor Climate Consortium (SCC) was formed in the fall of 2022 and has continued to grow in membership and activities. Prior to the formation of the SCC, both semiconductor manufacturers and semiconductor equipment manufacturers were actively looking for solutions to improve their sustainability. The challenge they had was finding companies that were working on sustainability solutions for the semiconductor industry, or that could be modified for the semiconductor industry.
SEMI, Lam Research, Applied Materials, Micron Technology, Intel, EMD, ASML, Samsung and Tokyo Electron joined forces and created the Startups for Sustainable Semiconductors program. This is where startups can submit a proposal to the S3 group and proceed through an initial selection and advisory process culminating in a pitch event in late April, where the finalists that present at Semicon West are selected.
The program pairs startups with an S3 company advisor, who can help tune the product for the semiconductor industry, and in some cases give them a site for proof-of-concept and prototyping tests before moving into mass scale. The industry companies supporting the S3 program have grown in 2024 to include Hynix, ASMPT, Infineon, and TOK.
The categories for 2024 are:
- Emissions: capture, and detection.
- Energy: new process designs for decreased energy intensity and improved thermal management, including data center cooling, Alternative energy sources, Energy tracking, and management software.
- Water: Liquid waste stream treatment, desalination, brine treatment, metals extraction, energy reduction processes for 100% water reuse, PFAS collection, removal, and destruction, Water measurement, planning & maintenance SW.
- Materials: Example materials: hydrogen, helium, rare earth elements, copper, ammonia, cobalt, metals, organics/inorganics. Sourcing, mining & refinement of materials used in semiconductor manufacturing, Sustainable processing, storing, or shipping of materials, including on-site production, Recycling and reuse methodologies, Green hydrogen and/or hydrogen recycling, Software/AI for sustainable chemicals + materials development
27 Semifinalists for the 2024 S3 cover a wide variety of measurement techniques, filtration of chemicals for recycling, PFA destruction, new process technologies, and water purification. They will be making their pitches on April 30th to the VC panelists. The list will be whittled down to about 10 finalists, who will present on Thursday at Semicon West.
If it is like past years, there will be several innovative ways to help the industry reach its sustainability goals. Hopefully someday the mainstream media will focus on the progress the Semiconductor industry is making toward improving its sustainability footprint rather than the other way around.
