Life-Cycle Assessment of Semiconductors

Book excerpt: Life-Cycle Assessment of Semiconductors presents the first and thus far only available transparent and complete life cycle assessment of semiconductor devices. A lack of reliable semiconductor LCA data has been a major challenge to evaluation of the potential environmental benefits of information technologies (IT). The analysis and results presented in this book will allow a higher degree of confidence and certainty in decisions concerning the use of IT in efforts to reduce climate change and other environmental effects. Coverage includes but is not limited to semiconductor manufacturing trends by product type and geography, unique coverage of life-cycle assessment, with a focus on uncertainty and sensitivity analysis of energy and global warming missions for CMOS logic devices, life cycle assessment of flash memory and life cycle assessment of DRAM. The information and conclusions discussed here will be highly relevant and useful to individuals and institutions.