How the chip industry is tackling CO2 and the global mission to go green

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Sustainability isn't a new concept to the semiconductor industry, but only now have officials begun getting a big picture view of the industry's impact on the environment and how well it is doing at getting greener.

www.fierceelectronics.com/, Nov. 07, 2023 – 

The formation of the Semiconductor Climate Consortium (SCC) has formalized what many companies in the industry were already doing, and the recent release of its report on carbon emissions is the first comprehensive study to span the entire value chain, including end user device consumption, chip manufacturing processes, and energy grids. The SCC is governed by SEMI, the industry association serving the global electronics manufacturing and design supply chain.

In an interview with Fierce Electronics, Mousumi Bhat, VP of sustainability programs at SEMI, said previous reports only touched on one segment of the industry, but in collaboration with the Climate Change Disclosure Program, the consortium now has a rich set of data that paints a more holistic picture. "It's one of the most comprehensive studies that you'll find," she said.

A key piece of data is that the semiconductor industry used 340 terawatt hours of electricity in 2022 – the equivalent of about 1.3% of global demand, Bhat said, and that percentage is growing. The international target set by the consortium was to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. These targets are aligned with the 1.5 degree Celsius global-warming target in the Paris Agreement of 2016.

The first sustainability milestone comes in 2025, when chip-industry emissions should peak and decline steadily, Bhat said. One aspiration is to bring emissions to half of the 2019 level by 2030.

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