Preliminary study on the effect of spray slurry nozzle in CMP for environmental sustainability

Abstract

In chemical mechanical planarization (CMP) industry, reducing slurry consumption without avoiding the drop in productivity is one of the most important requirements for environmental sustainability. In this paper, we propose a spray slurry nozzle to reduce the slurry consumption and increase the material removal rate (MRR) in SiO2 CMP. The spray slurry nozzle is compared with a commonly used tube-type slurry nozzle in terms of MRR, material removal uniformity, friction force, and process temperature. And, a case study on the greenhouse gas (GHG) emission associated with the slurry consumption is provided by polishing patterned wafers. Adopting the spray slurry nozzle in CMP process provides higher MRR, higher friction force, and shorter process time than the normal tubetype slurry nozzle. Thus, the spray slurry nozzle will diminish the carbon dioxide equivalent (CDE) associated with the slurry and electricity consumptions. Furthermore, using the spray nozzle decreases the process temperature and it may be used as a cooling system for the CMP process.