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October 2004 Semiconductor Safety Update

The environmental, heath, and safety standards that apply to semiconductor fabrication equipment continue to evolve, just as the semiconductor industry itself continues to change. Most but not all of these new standards are developing in SEMI standards meetings. These are some of the emerging standards to watch in the near future.

Ventilation - SEMI S6 is undergoing a major rewrite that will have a significant impact on the industry. The industry has long complied with F15 to ensure toxic chemistry can be adequately controlled under fault conditions. These requirements are now being incorporated into the new SEMI S6. But an even more significant change is the incorporation of internal air pattern assessment into the revised guideline. After it is adopted, this will require using tracer gas to test for pockets of flammables that might build up inside of a gas box under fault conditions. Proper airflow through the gas box will be required to pass this test. This practice was pioneered by Earth Tech and has been emerging in the industry as best practice for a number of years. After the passage of the new SEMI S6 it will become industry standard.

Robotics – SEMI S2-0200 and all subsequent versions made a distinction between industrial robots and wafer handlers, which left the requirements for wafer handlers poorly defined. A new task force in SEMI has taken on the challenge of more clearly defining these requirements in a way that makes sense for the semiconductor industry. This is a guideline that will have a significant impact on the industry and is one whose emergence should be followed closely.

Electrical – On September 28, 2004 a new IEC working group met in Nuremberg, Germany to discuss the first international electrical safety standard for semiconductor equipment. This working group is working under TC44, the IEC technical committee that owns IEC 60204, and its charter is to develop a stand-alone electrical safety standard for semiconductor fabrication equipment. This effort comes out of the harmonization movement in the semiconductor industry started by John Freudenberg of Teradyne over eight years ago. This is potentially a very positive development in the industry, because it can simplify the electrical requirements that are imposed on the industry around the world. But as with all standards activities, it is important to monitor this one and make sure it keeps going in the right direction.