Analysis of energy efficiency improvement of

high-tech fabrication plants

..............................................................................................................................................................

Shih-Cheng Hu1 , Tee Lin1 , Ben-Ran Fu2, *,† , Cheng-Kung Chang1 and I-Yun Cheng1
1
Department of Energy and Refrigerating Air-Conditioning Engineering, National Taipei
University of Technology, 1, Sec. 3, Zhongxiao E. Rd., Taipei 10608 Taiwan; 2 Department of
Mechanical Engineering, Ming Chi University of Technology, 84 Gungjuan Rd., Taishan
Dist., New Taipei City 24301, Taiwan
............................................................................................................................................

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Abstract
In this study, we developed simulation software for the energy consumption of high-tech fabrication
plants. The developed fab energy simulation (FES) featured more detailed characteristics of the subsystems
than existing simulation tools. The calculated results of the FES were validated using the annual oper-
ating data of a Taiwanese semiconductor manufacturing fab. The measured data indicated three major
energy consumers in the studied fab—the process tool, water chiller and clean dry air systems. The
annual consumption of electricity calculated with the FES showed a deviation of only −0.73% compared
with the measured data. The calculated results exhibited an energy consumption trend that was very
similar to the measured data, indicating the reliability of the FES. The FES results also demonstrated
excellent agreement with the calculated results of the commercial tool ‘CleanCalc II’. Additionally, the
FES was employed to study the energy consumption under different conditions. The results revealed
that the energy consumption of the chiller system reduced significantly by 43.7% when the chiller
system with a coefficient of performance of 8 was used. This reduction in the energy consumption
corresponded to 10% of the total energy consumption in the fab, indicating significant energy-saving
potential.

Keywords: high-tech cleanroom; energy consumption and saving; make-up air unit (MAU); chiller system
Corresponding author.
brfu@mx.nthu.edu.tw or
brfu@mail.mcut.edu.tw Received 29 September 2018; revised 24 May 2019; editorial decision 19 June 2019; accepted 19 June 2019
................................................................................................................................................................................

1 INTRODUCTION
High-tech fabrication plants (generally called fabs) used for the
production of the semiconductor or thin-film-transistor liquid-
crystal display (TFT-LCD) are energy-intensive and technology-
intensive industries [1]. It is necessary to explore the energy
consumption in detail to examine the energy-saving opportuni-
ties in a high-tech fab. Semiconductor Equipment and Materials
International (SEMI) issued guidelines (termed as SEMI S23) for
energy, electricity and production conservation for semiconduc-
tor facility systems. The latest version of these guidelines is called
SEMI S23-0813, which provides the energy conversion factors
(ECFs) for all important utilities [2]. The SEMI ECFs can be used
to estimate the overall energy consumption of the utilities and
could be good indicators for the process designer to modify their
recipes to reduce the energy use in fabs. It is necessary to measure
operating conditions of facilities to acquire real ECFs. However,
accomplishing this is difficult for many fabs due to the lack of
a monitoring system. Table 1 summarizes the SEMI ECFs estab-
lished based on a specific fab with a cleanroom area of 4400 m2 and
a monthly use of 10 000 pieces of 200-mm wafers. Although these
ECFs may be unsuitable for other fabs with different conditions,
they can serve as a reference. Furthermore, SEMI S23-0813 did
not provide any suggestion on modifying the conversion factor
for different operating conditions of the fab. Generally, high-tech
fabs are significantly different from commercial buildings. A fab
requires a significant amount of external air, and the arrangements
for the external and circulating air are often treated separately.
The energy analysis software for commercial buildings is typically
designed to handle air-conditioning systems for the external air
mixed with return air through a centralized system and excludes
the electricity consumption of facilities such as process cooling
water (PCW), compressed (or clean) dry air (CDA), nitrogen,
vacuum and exhaust systems in the fabs.

† Ben-Ran Fu, http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9246-1485

International Journal of Low-Carbon Technologies 2019, 14, 508–515
© The Author(s) 2019. Published by Oxford University Press.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which
permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
doi:10.1093/ijlct/ctz041 Advance Access publication 12 August 2019 508

Table 1. ECFs suggested in the SEMI S23-0813 [2].
Facility (sub-system) or material
1. Exhaust
2. Vacuum
3. Clean dry air (CDA)
4. High pressure CDA (for 827–1034 kPa, gauge)
5. Water cooled by refrigeration (for T = 5◦ C)
6. Water cooled by cooling tower
7. UPWb or DIWb (for temperature <25◦ C)
8. Hot UPW or DIW (for temperature >85◦ C)
9. Heat load:
Heat removal via air
Heat removal via water
Cooling load
10. N2
11. Electricity
On the basis of the equivalent volume at the pressure of 101 kPa and temperature of 20◦ C.
UPW: ultra-pure water; DIW: de-ionized water.
2 LITERATURE REVIEW ON ENERGY
CONSUMPTION ANALYSIS
Wang et al. [3] conducted a case study on the energy conservation
performance of a TFT-LCD manufacturing fab. They reported
that the energy consumption of process tools accounted for 41.6%
of the total energy consumption in the studied TFT-LCD fab,
which was very close to that of semiconductor manufacturing fabs
[4]. Additionally, the findings indicated that a CDA system con-
sumed the largest portion (19.8%) of the energy among all facility
systems studied. Based on the measured data on energy consump-
tion, Wang et al. [3] further proposed a baseline correlation for
the total energy consumption of a TFT-LCD fab as a function of
the wet-bulb temperature and monthly average production yield.
Furthermore, they also discussed several energy-saving strategies
that could reduce the total energy consumption by 2.4% consider-
ing the process tools or facility systems. They also demonstrated
that the improvements in energy efficiency, such as pipe leak-
age prevention, heat loss reduction and exhaust heat recovery,
constituted the most efficient energy-saving methods. Yan and
Chien [5] presented an integrated analysis of energy consumption
and energy efficiency with economic contributions for high-tech
industries in Taiwan’s science parks. They proposed an energy-
efficiency economy index to evaluate the energy consumption of
the studied science parks. Their results demonstrated that given
the same economic contributions, the high-tech industries in the
science parks consumed less energy (also yielding lower CO2
emissions) when compared to others.
In addition to the detailed information on energy consumption,
energy management systems (EMS) or analysis tools were exten-
sively developed for various applications or industries [6–8]. For
example, Wei et al. [7] used the concept of Internet-of-things to
develop EMS for industrial facilities. Their EMS concept provided
immediate interconnectivity and interoperability between devices
and facilities, which could enable locating possible energy-saving
Energy efficiency improvement of high-tech fabrication plants
Unit ECF Condition or remark
kWh/m 3
0.0037 Exhaust pressure = 2 kPa
kWh/m3 0.060 Vacuum pressure = 5.88 kPa
kWh/m3 0.147a
kWh/m3 0.175a
kWh/m3 1.56 Supply pressure = 490 kPa. For other T, ECF = 0.258 ×
T + 0.273
kWh/m3 0.260 Supply pressure = 490 kPa
kWh/m3 9.0 Supply pressure = 196 kPa
kWh/m3 92.2 No suggested ECF for the temperature of 25–85◦ C
kWh/m3 ◦ C 3.24 × 10−4 This conversion factor accounts for the energy that may be
kWh/m3 ◦ C 1.16 used to operate the cleanroom air conditioning
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kWh/m3 ◦ C 0.287
kWh/m3 0.250a Supply pressure = 793 kPa
kWh/kWh 1.0 This ECF can be further modified by accounting for the
efficiency of the generating electricity through different ways
opportunities. Recently, several review articles have focused on
EMS or energy-saving technologies and applications [9–11]. For
example, Saidur et al. [9] examined the detailed energy consump-
tion of a compressed air (CA) system that consumed ∼10% of
the total industrial energy use in a few countries. Evidently, a
CA or CDA system is also another important facility in the fabs.
The literature review performed by Saidur et al. [9] indicated that
the overall energy efficiency of a CA system was only 10–20%
and the major energy loss was attributed to the heat dissipation
and air leakage during the process. They further revealed that the
energy savings of a CA system could be achieved using a high-
efficiency motor or through a variable speed drive in the motor.
The study also recommended leakage reduction and waste heat
reuse by a recuperator to improve the overall energy efficiency of
a CA system.
Given rigorous limitations of the environmental temperature
and humidity, the maintenance of a cleanroom is one of the most
important tasks for subsystems, which also consumes a signif-
icant portion of the energy. Humidity in large-scale high-tech
cleanrooms is generally controlled by a make-up air unit (MAU)
system consisting of a fan, two-stage cooling coils, a heating coil
(or heater), filters and a humidifier. The designed humidity ratio
in the fabs is much lower than that in heating, ventilation and
air conditioning (HVAC) systems used in commercial buildings.
The temperature of the chilled water for the cooling coil inside
an MAU system is typically 5–7◦ C. The low temperature of the
supplied water reduces the efficiency of the chiller. Chua et al.
[12] reviewed technologies and strategies, such as novel cooling
devices, innovative system designs and integration and opera-
tional management and control, to enhance the efficiency of an
air-conditioning system. Kircher et al. [13] reported the model-
ing and simulation of the energy consumption of a cleanroom.
In their study, four different approaches were further simulated
to assess the energy-saving potentials for the cleanroom. Their
results showed that implementing a heat recovery system for
International Journal of Low-Carbon Technologies 2019, 14, 508–515 509
S.-C. Hu et al.
exhaust air may be the most efficient way of reducing the energy
consumption (resulting in an 11.4% energy reduction).
Hu and Tsao [14] investigated the effect of the layout of an
HVAC system on the energy efficiency for a typical 200-mm
wafer fab. Their results indicated that a MAU combined with a
fan-filter unit (FFU) system corresponded to the optimal energy
consumption performance. They also found that the energy use of
an air recirculation unit (RCU) system was considerably higher
than that in the best-case scenario. They further demonstrated
that the energy consumption of the RCU system could be reduced
by 50% by mixing certain portions of the return air with the
make-up air. Generally, an MAU system provides external air,
which is then mixed with recirculated air from the cleanroom.
A high air-circulation rate in the fabs leads to a correspondingly
high cooling capacity of external air, leading to significant energy
consumption. Lin et al. [15] proposed a fan dry coil unit-based
return system to satisfy the requirements of air circulation in a
cleanroom. Their experimental results showed that the proposed
system was significantly more effective in heat removal of process
tools and reduced the energy consumption by 4% compared to
a traditional air circulation system. Luo et al. [16] investigated
different energy-saving approaches for facilities in semiconduc-
tor fabs—(1) different methods for the gas consumption of an
organic process system, (2) constant or dynamically changed
output of the flow rate of a cooling tower system, (3) online
pump control for a vacuum system and (4) heat recovery by
the MAU system. Their results demonstrated that the facilities’
energy consumption could be reduced by 25.24% if these four
approaches were simultaneously employed. In addition, the first
of the aforementioned methods contributed about 70% of the
saved energy, whereas the contribution from the third one was
negligible.
Recently, Hu et al. [17] conducted a study on the assessment
of SEMI ECFs and their application in semiconductor and LCD
fabs. They also developed a new calculator having corresponding
mathematical models for each subsystem for ECFs in high-tech
fabs. Their results showed that most of the ECF values estimated
by the new calculator were very close to the values reported in the
SEMI S23-0813 while employing the same operating conditions.
Their ECF calculator can be used to understand the detailed
contribution of each variable to the energy consumption of each
system in the fab better, and therefore, it can be used as a straight-
forward tool for energy-saving tasks or for new fab designs. In
addition, they used this ECF calculator to analyze in detail the
energy consumption of three Taiwanese high-tech fabs. Based on
analytical results, they further concluded that the efficiency of the
energy consumption in the older-generation wafer fab (200-mm
wafers) could be improved by upgrading some of its systems, such
as air compressor and chilled water systems.
3 OBJECTIVES OF THIS STUDY
Given the aforementioned issues, the preliminary objectives of
this study involved developing energy-consumption simulation
510 International Journal of Low-Carbon Technologies 2019, 14, 508–515
software [fab energy simulation (FES)] for high-tech fabs. The
FES developed in the present study featured more detailed char-
acteristics compared to existing simulation tools, such as higher
suitability for HVAC systems, automatic coil controls and several
arrangements of components in an MAU system, which were
much closer to the practical application. The results of the FES
were validated using the annual operating data of a Taiwanese
semiconductor manufacturing fab and furthercompared with the
calculated results of a commercial tool ‘CleanCalc II’ [18]. Clean-
Calc II was also used to analyze the fab’s energy consumption.
Most importantly, the major objectives of this study involved
employing the developed FES tool to assess the fab’s energy con-
sumption under different operating conditions to explore possible
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energy-saving opportunities.
4 METHODOLOGY
The present FES with a Windows-based user interface was devel-
oped using the ‘Visual Basic.Net’ programming software. As an
example of the input interface, Figure 1 demonstrates user input
interfaces for the HVAC system in the FES. Design parameters or
operating conditions, such as room temperature, relative humid-
ity (RH) and supply/return temperature of the chilled water, were
inputted via the user interface of the FES. This was followed
by displaying the calculated results in the form of detailed data
or figures for further comparisons. The energy consumptions in
the fabs were generally derived from several parts including the
HVAC system, exhaust system, PCW, ultra-pure water (UPW),
CDA, nitrogen, vacuum, fans, pumps, process tools and lighting
system. All the aforementioned utilities and materials were con-
sidered in the developed FES. Some of them are briefly described
in the following sections.
4.1 Major facilities
A segregated-type HVAC system, consisting of an MAU, FFU and
dry cooling coil (DCC), was employed as the major air circula-
tion system in the present simulated cleanroom, as depicted in
Figure 2. Before entering the target cleanroom with return air, the
outdoor air was regulated according to the designed conditions
in the MAU system. The system adjusted the temperature and
humidity of the outdoor air by using cooling/heating coils and
a humidifier, respectively. The DCC removed the sensible heat
of return air. An FFU on the ceiling pulled mixed air from a
supply plenum and injected it into the cleanroom. The energy
consumption of the HVAC system could be simply divided among
a water chiller, humidification system and heating system. A water
chiller adsorbed the heat from the MAU cooling coil, PCW and
DCC. A humidifier in the MAU system could be a steam-type
humidifier, vapor-type humidifier or air washer–type humidifier.
The present study only considered electric heating to simplify
the heater’s energy consumption. An exhaust system’s electricity
consumption can be divided into two categories. The first involves
power requirements of fans that inject energy into the air to

Figure 1. User input interface for a HVAC system in the FES.
Figure 2. Schematic diagram of a typical HVAC system for the cleanroom.
boost the pressure or velocity of the air to satisfy static pressure
requirements for a process tool and to overcome friction loss
through pipelines. The second one is the HVAC system. A certain
degree of positive pressure should be applied to a cleanroom
to prevent the external pollution from penetrating through the
cracks into the cleanroom and thereby maintain the required
cleanliness. A vacuum pump and air compressor mainly con-
tribute to the energy consumptions of vacuum and CDA sys-
tems, respectively. The CDA system generally consists of an air
compressor, storage tanks, dryers and several filters. A vacuum
pump is slightly different from a normal compressor. The cylinder
capacity ratio for a vacuum pump exceeds that of a normal com-
pressor, given the same amount of power. Additionally, suction
pressure changes with time for a vacuum pump, whereas it is
Energy efficiency improvement of high-tech fabrication plants
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generally constant for a normal air compressor. The maximum
compression work for a vacuum pump occurs approximately
during the suction status of half vacuum. In addition, the present
FES deals with the steady-state conditions of the clean room.
Therefore, the transient characteristics of each component are
outside the scope of the present study.
A PCW system was used to remove the major part of heat gen-
erated by equipment, such as an exposure machine, ion implanter
and diffusion furnace, during the manufacturing process. Gen-
erally, the temperature requirement of a PCW is not too low
for the semiconductor manufacturing industry (∼13–20◦ C). The
temperature of a water chiller is about 7◦ C. As listed in Table 1, the
ECF (defined as the energy consumption per unit flow rate) for a
PCW using the refrigeration system suggested by SEMI S23-0813
was 1.56 kWh/m3 for T = 5◦ C and ECF = 0.258 × T + 0.273
for other T. Here, T denotes the temperature difference of
water between an inlet and an outlet. In the present study, the
energy consumption of the exhaust, vacuum, CDA, nitrogen and
water supply systems were determined based on ECFs, while the
energy consumption of an HVAC system was estimated from
operating conditions or measured data. The air-conditioning pro-
cess and control method of each component in the FES were user
selectable. According to the type of humidification system, the
control parameter of the outlet air of the cooling and heating
coils in the MAU system could correspond to the dew-point
temperature, dry temperature or wet-bulb temperature. A default
reference value of the chosen control method for a component
is automatically calculated based on the input parameters. Fur-
thermore, such reference values could be manually adjusted via
a user interface of the FES to meet system design specifications.
Furthermore, properties of the air used in the FES were calculated
according to equations suggested in the ASHRAE handbook [19].
4.2 Mathematical models
This section summarizes the equations used in the FES. Given an
overall energy balance in a cleanroom, the heat generation (qgen ,
International Journal of Low-Carbon Technologies 2019, 14, 508–515 511
S.-C. Hu et al.
Figure 3. Detailed distribution of the measured energy use: (a) process tool, (b) water chiller, (c) CDA, (d) UPW, (e) PCW, (f) exhaust, (g) FFU, (h) humidifier and
fans of MAU and RCU, (i) lighting, (j) vacuum and (k) water pump.
unit: kW) is equal to heat removal (qre , unit: kW)
qgen = qre .
The heat could be generated from the lighting system, FFU
system fans, process tools and employees, while the heat removal
could be performed through the exhaust systems, PCW, MAU
and DCC.With respect to the cooling or heating coil in the MAU
system, the heat transfer rate (qcoil , unit: kW) can be calculated as
follows:
qcoil = V̇MAU ρair Cp,a (Tout − Tin ) ,
where V̇MAU denotes volume flow rate (unit: m3 /s) of the external
air in the MAU system, ρair denotes air density (unit: kg/m3 ), Cp,a
denotes the heat capacity of air (unit: kJ/(kg. K)) and T out and
T in denote the air temperature (unit: ◦ C) at the coil outlet and
inlet, respectively. Additionally, the water mass flow rate require-
ment (mw , unit: kg/s) for the humidifier in the MAU system was
obtained based on the difference of the humidity ratio (w, unit:
none) of the air between the outlet and inlet of the humidifier,
mw = V̇MAU ρair (wout − win ) .
The energy consumption (W E , unit: kWh) of the materials and
facilities (except for the HVAC system) for the fabs is estimated
using the following equation:
 
WE = V̇run × trun + V̇idle × tidle × ECF,
where V̇run and V̇idle (or t run and t idle ) denote the flow rates
(unit: m3 /s) (or the occupied proportion of the time, unit: s)
during operating and idle conditions, respectively. Furthermore,
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the energy use of the process tools is only the electricity, of which
the ECF is considered to be 1.0, as depicted in Table 1 [2].
(1)
5 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
5.1 Validation
Measured data from a semiconductor manufacturing fab (in
Hsinchu, Taiwan) were used to validate the FES results in the
present study. With respect to this studied fab, the total floor
area corresponded to 13 812 m2 (with a height of 3.5 m for each
(2) floor) with ∼150 workers under normal operating conditions.
The temperature and RH in the cleanroom of the fab were
23◦ C and 45%, respectively, whereas the lighting intensity was
0.0119 kW/m2 and the cooling load of each worker was estimated
as 0.16 kW. The usage amounts of the FFU and the MAU system
in the fab were 5300 and 6 sets, respectively. The sequential
arrangement of the MAU components for the fab is as follows:
fan, pre-heating coil, pre-cooling coil, humidifier (using an air
washer), cooling coil and re-heating coil (from the inlet to the
outlet). The RH at the exit of the cooling coil was 100%, and the
(3) dry-bulb temperature of the supply air from the MAU system
was 14◦ C. Additionally, the pump head of the air washer was
93.8 m, the designed flow rate of water was 200 l/min and the
pump efficiency was 65%.
Figure 3 shows the detailed distribution of the energy con-
sumption for the studied fab with an annual electricity con-
sumption of 150 GWh in 2013. The measured data indicated
(4) three major energy consumers in the fab—the process tool, water
chiller and CDA. In contrast, systems such as the water pump,
vacuum or lighting consumed less than 1% of the total energy
consumed by the fab. Additionally, the studied fab did not indi-
cate any energy-usage information regarding nitrogen, because
 Energy efficiency improvement of high-tech fabrication plants

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Figure 4. FES calculated results of the energy use: (a) process tool, (b) water chiller, (c) CDA, (d) UPW, (e) PCW, (f) exhaust, (g) FFU, (h) humidifier and fans of
MAU and RCU, (i) lighting, (j) vacuum and (k) water pump.

nitrogen was not produced on site (it was supplied by a gas Table 2. Results of the energy use of the FES and measurement.
manufacturer). However, it should be noted that the energy con-
Component or system FES calculation Measurement Deviation (%)
sumption in local nitrogen production could account for a large (GWh) (GWh)
proportion (6.6%) of the total energy consumption in the fab
[4]. It is also interesting to note that the proportion of energy Process tool 81.7 81.5 0.19
Water chiller 33.9 35.1 −3.57
consumption of the process tools was significantly greater than CDA (including high 9.83 9.80 0.23
that reported by Hu and Chuah [4]. Thus, the energy consump- pressure)
tion of the fab subsystems accounted for a smaller proportion UPW 8.47 8.45 0.27
of the total energy consumption than that reported by Hu and PCW 4.04 4.03 0.26
Chuah [4]. These results could be attributed to the complicated Exhaust 3.52 3.51 0.34
FFU 2.93 2.91 0.39
formula involved in state-of-the-art products (given considerable Humidifier and fans of 1.85 1.92 −3.51
advances in electronic devices) as well as energy-saving imple- MAU and RCU
mentations (or performance enhancements) in the facility sys- Lighting 1.44 1.44 0.27
tems, particularly for chiller systems in the past decade. According Vacuum 0.70 0.71 −1.33
to the measured data, the ECFs of the exhaust (excluding MAU Water pump 0.073 0.073 0
Annual energy use 148 150 −0.73
system), MAU, PCW, UPW, vacuum and CDA systems for the
studied fab corresponded to 0.000723, 0.0028, 0.383, 8, 0.04 and
0.171 kWh/m3 , respectively. It may be noted that the SEMI ECF
for the exhaust system (i.e. 0.0037 kWh/m3 , as shown in Table 1) study, only the total annual energy consumption of the studied fab
included the MAU system. However, the present study reported could be obtained from the manufacturer, but monthly results can
the ECF of the MAU system in detail for further applications of be presented with the FES. Therefore, a comparison between the
the FES, while changing the operating conditions of the MAU measured and FES calculated results was conducted for annual
system. Additionally, the coefficient of performance (COP) of a energy consumption. The table indicates that the deviations for
chiller system with the heat recovery design used in the fab was most facilities were less than 1%, except for the water chiller
4.5. (−3.57%); humidifier, MAU and RCU fans (−3.51%) and vacuum
Figure 4 shows the FES-calculated results of the energy con- system (−1.33%). The main reason for the deviations was related
sumption for the studied fab. Annual electricity usage calculated to the used condition of the outdoor air. In the present FES,
by the FES was 148 GWh with a deviation of −1.09 GWh (i.e. the outdoor air conditions were employed based on the average
only −0.73%) relative to the measured data. The calculated results weather data of Hsinchu, Taiwan, in 2012 [20].
clearly demonstrated a highly similar trend of energy consump- The calculated results of the FES were further compared with
tion with the measured data as shown in Figures 3 and 4. The those of CleanCalc II, as shown in Table 3. To meet the input
results indicated reliability of the present FES. Table 2 summarizes requirement (or limitation) of CleanCalc II and facilitate an
the detailed results of the FES and measurement. In the present equivalent comparison, some operating parameters of the studied

International Journal of Low-Carbon Technologies 2019, 14, 508–515 513

S.-C. Hu et al.

Table 3. Calculated results of the FES and CleanCalc II. the exhaust system reduced by only 3.69% (0.13 GWh), where one
may expect a nearly 10% decrease in the energy consumption, as
Component or system FES (GWh) CleanCalc II (GWh)
the flow rate of the exhaust system decreased by 10%. This unex-
PCW 4.03 4.03 pected result comes from the complex system arrangement in the
CDA 8.55 8.55 fab. Additionally, the case C results demonstrated that reducing
High pressure CDA 1.25 1.25
Vacuum 0.70 0.70
the dry-bulb temperature of the MAU supply air from 14◦ C to
UPW 8.45 8.45 11◦ C resulted in energy savings of 1.20 GWh (8.63% saving in
Exhaust 3.43 3.51 the energy consumption of the MAU system). Most importantly,
HVAC 19.8 19.9 for case D, the results indicated that the chiller system’s energy
Electric use (including process 85.8 85.8 consumption reduced significantly by 14.8 GWh (43.7%) by using
tool, lighting and others)
Annual energy use 132 132
a chiller system with a COP of 8, which could correspond to the
best performance of the water-cooled centrifugal chiller [22]. In
general, the COP value has a higher level during partial-loaded

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fab were modified and included using the isothermal process of
the pre-heating coil, neglecting other cooling loads, using mist
humidification and non-heat recovery-type chiller and using the
MAU system with electrical heating. The results demonstrated
excellent agreement between the FES and CleanCalc II for most
components and systems. The deviation of the exhaust system was
the most significant (2.33%) due to the different conditions of the
outdoor air used in the FES and CleanCalc II (using weather data
in Taipei, 1982–99 [21]). It was also concluded that the developed
FES could function as well as CleanCalc II, and most importantly,
the developed FES involved several user-defined parameters (i.e.
a flexible user interface) that could not be inputted in CleanCalc
II. However, for a fab with other unintroduced systems in the
FES, the developed tool cannot be directly employed to calculate
energy consumption without any change.
5.2 Application
The present FES was utilized to study the energy consumption of
fabs under different operating conditions such as changes in the
temperature difference of the PCW system (case A), discharging
flow rate of the exhaust system (case B), dry-bulb temperature
of the supply air from the MAU system (case C) and the COP
of the chiller system (case D). Table 4 summarizes the calculated
results of the FES for different cases. The case A results show
that the energy consumption of the PCW system increased from
4.04 GWh to 6.33 GWh (56.7% increase) as T decreased from
5◦ C to 3◦ C. However, the energy consumption of the PCW system
decreased from 4.04 GWh to 2.71 GWh (32.9% decrease) as T
increased from 5◦ C to 7◦ C. For case B, the energy consumption of
operations of the chiller. However, in [22], the COP value of 8 was
reported in both full-loaded and partial-loaded operations under
different chiller conditions. Therefore, we chose this COP level as
a reference value. This reduction in the energy consumption of
the chiller system was ∼10% of the total energy consumption in
the fab, which indicated significant energy-saving potential. The
result of the energy-saving potential in case D is consistent with
the theoretical prediction when the COP of the chiller increases
from 4.5 to 8. In addition, the results of those studied cases
for possible energy-saving approaches can be useful for practical
applications while modifying the system. Undoubtedly, the effi-
ciency enhancement of energy consumption would decrease the
fab’s operating cost. However, the capital outlay, especially for the
equipment, is outside the scope of the present study. As mentioned
in the manuscript, a fab has several subsystems. Therefore, it is
difficult to carry out the cost analysis of the equipment, especially
for a non-equipment supplier. Furthermore, the above results
could also indicate the baseline data for energy-saving approaches
and benchmarking the energy-use efficiency of fabs that produce
similar products.
6 CONCLUSIONS
In this study, an FES analysis tool for the energy consumption
of high-tech fabs was developed. The FES results were validated
using the annual operating data of a Taiwanese semiconductor-
manufacturing fab and further compared with the calculated
results of a commercial tool ‘CleanCalc II’. Furthermore, the
present FES was employed to study the energy consumption of

Table 4. Comparison of the calculated results of the FES under different operating conditions.
Case Affected system Original Original result Modified Modified result Difference Energy-saving
condition (GWh) condition (GWh) (GWh) potential (%)

A1 PCW T = 5◦ C 4.04 T = 3◦ C 6.33 2.29 −56.7

A2 PCW T = 5◦ C 4.04 T = 7◦ C 2.71 −1.33 32.9
Ba Exhaust – 3.52 – 3.39 −0.13 3.69
C MAU 14◦ C 13.9 11◦ C 12.7 −1.20 8.63
D Chiller COP = 4.5 33.9 COP = 8 19.1 −14.8 43.7
a Reducing the flow rate of the exhaust system by 10% as the modified condition.

514 International Journal of Low-Carbon Technologies 2019, 14, 508–515


the fab under different operating conditions, which could indicate
potential energy-saving opportunities. The main findings of this
study are as follows:
(1) The measured data of the studied fab indicated three
major energy consumers, namely the process tool, water
chiller and CDA. In contrast, systems including the water
pump, vacuum or lighting consumed <1% of the total
energy consumption of the fab. The measured data revealed
that the ECFs of the exhaust (excluding MAU system),
MAU, PCW, UPW, vacuum and CDA systems for the
studied fab were 0.000723 kWh/m3 , 0.0028 kWh/m3 ,
0.383 kWh/m3 , 8, 0.04 kWh/m3 and 0.171 kWh/m3 ,
respectively.
(2) The annual electricity consumption calculated by the FES
exhibited a deviation of −0.73% with the measured data.
The calculated results clearly demonstrated a highly similar
trend of energy consumption with the measured data. The
FES results also demonstrated excellent agreement with
the calculated results of the commercial tool ‘CleanCalc
II’. The results indicated the reliability of the present
+FES.
(3) Regarding the application of the FES, the results illustrated
that the energy consumption of the chiller system signifi-
cantly reduced by 43.7% when the chiller system with a COP
of 8 was used. This reduction in the energy consumption of
the chiller system was ∼10% of the total energy consump-
tion in the fab, which indicated significant energy-saving
potential. Additionally, lowering the dry-bulb temperature
of the MAU-supplied air by 3◦ C could result in 8.63%
savings in the energy consumption of the MAU system. In
contrast, the energy consumption of the exhaust system only
reduced by 3.69% as the flow rate of the exhaust system
decreased by 10%.
The FES developed in this study was also employed in our
previous study [23] to analyze the energy consumption of a TFT-
LCD fab (with significantly different layouts of the presently
studied semiconductor fab) and examine potential energy-saving
approaches for the MAU system. The result of [23] can be used
to demonstrate the capacity of generalization of the present
FES. Based on the present results, it was further concluded
that the developed FES could be a reliable tool in analyzing
the energy consumption of a fab, and it could indicate the
baseline data for energy-saving approaches and for benchmarking
the energy-consumption efficiency of fabs that produce similar
products.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Technol-
ogy, Taiwan (grant number: MOST 105-3114-E-027-007-CC2).
Energy efficiency improvement of high-tech fabrication plants
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