A large amount of energy is constantly used for air conditioning management, operation of manufacturing equipment and producing testing in the manufacturing processes of semiconductor products and HDD products. PFC (perfluoro compound) gas is used in the etching process of semiconductor manufacturing, and CFC (chlorofluorocarbon) refrigerants such as HFC (hydrofluorocarbon) are used in cooling equipment such as air conditioning systems. Some of these gases also lead to climate change that is thousands of times more severe than CO2.
Our corporate group has therefore launched a project that crosses over corporate organizations in 2004, to reduce greenhouse gases with emphasis on “efficient manufacturing”. We consider facilities with greater energy saving effects and refrigerant equipment with low greenhouse effects when upgrading facilities. At present, a large amount of energy is consumed to operate clean rooms and there are a large number of similar facilities in each process. An understanding and awareness of the process will lead to a significant reduction in the use of energy and gas.
Japan Semiconductor Corporation Oita Operations
We added a new line to utilize the waste heat of the clean room building that was unused. When there is a high demand for waste heat in winter, cold water is supplied from the power building, and meanwhile in summer, the refrigerating equipment in the clean room building is used to reduce the amount of electricity used for pumping water. In this way, we are increasing the use of waste heat in consideration of the energy of the entire plant.
Amount of CO2 reduction due to this measure: 650t-CO2 / 4 months (December 2019 - March 2020)