Environmental impacts of microchip manufacture

Environmental impacts associated with the manufacture of semiconductor devices are characterized from two perspectives: a qualitative survey of key issues and quantitative analysis of energy and entropy associated with the processes in the production chain. The main issues of environmental concern are emissions from fabs, health effects on line workers and high energy and material use. Results of analysis of material use in the production chain suggest that total weight of secondary fossil fuel and chemical inputs to produce and use a single 2-g 32MB DRAM chip are 1600 and 72 g, respectively. Secondary inputs of fossil fuels to manufacture a chip total 600 times its weight, high compared to a factor of 1–2 for an automobile or refrigerator. Due to its extremely low-entropy, organized structure, the materials intensity of a microchip is orders of magnitude higher than that of “traditional” goods.