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ERIC J. TONNIS, Litmas Inc., Charlotte, NC, USA

ABSTRACT

As part of the semiconductor industry’s Partnership for PFC Emissions Reduction program, many fabs are actively evaluating several kinds of PFC abatement systems. Each of these abatement methods uses external energy from either electricity or from fuel combustion to destroy the thermodynamically stable PFCs emitted by semiconductor etch and CVD processes. The production and use of these energy sources results in global warming emissions that detract from the overreaching goal of reducing the global warming footprint of semiconductor processing tools. In this article, the global warming trade-offs between energy usage and PFC abatement are explored with example calculations showing how these trade-offs affect the overall global warming reduction efficiency of sample abatement devices.