Building a More Sustainable Semiconductor, From Footprint to Fab

By Todd Brady, Chief Sustainability Officer and VP of Global Public Affairs, Intel

The very nature of manufacturing continues to progress and thrive. From the early days of the Industrial Revolution to the introduction of the assembly line, automation, robotics, and now artificial intelligence (AI), the industry has continuously evolved. Today, it’s all about sustainability—creating the best possible products with the smallest environmental impact or, like here at Intel, to create world-changing technology with zero impact.

Decades before most companies were talking about “Net Zero” or “Carbon Neutral,” Intel understood that we needed to proactively reduce our emissions. When I started my career as an engineer with Intel 28 years ago, one of my first jobs was to create models to predict the emissions, including greenhouse gases, from the process technologies at the heart of our manufacturing operations. Since then, we’ve been incrementally creating a new era of responsible manufacturing.

While Intel is committed to expanding our operations, we’re also committed to doing so with our environmental footprint in mind. In Ireland, where we recently announced the start of high-volume manufacturing using Intel 4 technology, our Fab 34 is on track to achieve LEED Gold certification by reducing greenhouse gas emissions, purchasing 100% renewable energy, reducing water use, and sending less waste to landfills. Our climate action plan for this manufacturing facility is a prime example of how Intel delivers—on our technology leadership and on our commitments to the future of sustainable manufacturing.

And at our expansion site in Chandler, Arizona, where we just announced that the initial cleanroom is “weather tight,” Intel has kept more than 25,000 tons of construction debris from its Arizona waste streams. The Ocotillo campus also recently earned Platinum level certification from the Alliance for Water Stewardship (AWS), recognizing Intel’s ongoing commitment to water conservation and restoration.

Every day, I field questions from customers, suppliers, industry associations, reporters, and elected officials about what Intel is doing, what’s working, and what’s next. Want to know more? Keep reading.

What are the sustainability goals Intel is working toward?

Everything we’re doing ties into our design for sustainability. Intel’s goal is to minimize energy use, emissions, water use, and waste generation in our current and future operations. 

In addition to our goals to reduce our own operational footprint, our corporate responsibility strategy outlines the targets we have set to reduce our value chain footprint and catalyzes industry-wide action to address climate change. For instance, we’re committed to reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions in our global operations by 2040, 100% renewable electricity by 2030, net positive water by 2030, and zero waste to landfills by 2030. We are asking our supply chain to support us in achieving these goals and in turn, to set their own targets.  These goals build on decades of progress. Our sustainability strategy and the partnerships we are creating with governments, suppliers, and customers are making a significant impact.

What is Intel doing today to reduce carbon emissions?

We look at three scopes of emissions:

• Scope 1: Emissions from our direct operations
• Scope 2: Emissions associated with the electricity that we use
• Scope 3: Emissions created upstream and downstream of our value chain

Achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions across our global operations requires that we continue our decades long progress to replace chemicals, abate emissions, drive energy conservation, natural gas reduction and renewable energy purchases. Our emissions are 4X lower today because of these actions. However, to achieve net-zero we need to further identify, develop, and pilot novel green chemistry and abatement solutions—many of which do not exist today. We’ve achieved 93% renewable electricity purchases globally with our sights set on 100%. We have conserved more than 970 million kWh of energy cumulatively since 2020—the equivalent of more than 90,000 U.S. homes’ annual electricity use.

As we are building new factories, we’re advancing our systems to maximize the use of waste heat from our factories (thereby reducing our dependency on natural gas), developing ultra-efficient abatement, and exploring technologies that greatly reduce the use of fossil fuels in our future factory designs.

But we must tackle climate change collectively. Our approach to reducing scope 3 supplier greenhouse gas emissions involves partnering with suppliers across the semiconductor manufacturing value chain to develop new technology solutions and support the transition to net zero. We’re working with the Semiconductor Climate Consortium, and Schneider Electric’s Catalyze program to accelerate solutions to reduce our industry’s emissions and partnering with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Product Attribute to Impact Algorithm (PAIA) consortium to establish standard calculations methodologies to report the product carbon footprint for our industry.

Semiconductor fabrication is a water-intensive process. How is Intel addressing the issue of water to achieve its net positive water goal?

Over the past decade, our water conservation efforts have saved an estimated 52 billion gallons of water, enough to sustain about 470,000 U.S. homes for one year. We’ve accelerated these efforts, more than doubling our water conservation over the past 3 years. We’re responsibly managing our water use, guided by our Global Water Policy, to meet our business needs and the needs of our communities. 

Our net positive water strategy has three main objectives: conserve water used in our operations, collaborate on water initiatives with local communities, and create technology solutions to help others reinvent how they use and conserve water. We aim to achieve net positive water by conserving 60 billion gallons of water (cumulative from 2020) and funding water projects that will restore more fresh water than we consume to our local watersheds. This year, we expect to conserve and restore a total of 12 billion gallons of water in our operations, community collaborations, and watershed restoration projects.

How does Intel think about circularity, the concept of reducing waste?  

This “circular economy” approach means keeping products and materials in use for as long as possible and then giving them a new life. As an industry, we recognize that we must reduce waste and find innovative ways to recover, reuse, and upcycle. The principles of circular economies and how they apply to our manufacturing activities and the supply chain are a cornerstone of our effort to reduce our operational footprint. 

Much of our waste is generated by construction and manufacturing activities. We’re looking across the business to find ways to upcycle materials and have made great progress, upcycling over two-thirds of our manufacturing waste in 2022. That includes reusing solvents, acids, metals, minimizing packaging waste, and working with our suppliers to repurpose materials containing precious metals and minimize e-waste. Our supply chain is pivotal in implementing circular economy solutions for upcycling manufacturing waste, extending the useful life of equipment and returned products, reclaiming materials, and using post-consumer recycled materials on transportation media. Last year, these efforts across our supply chain kept more than 77,000 metric tons of waste out of landfills.

What lessons has Intel learned throughout its work toward sustainable semiconductor manufacturing?

This is a complex challenge. Getting to net zero isn’t something companies tackle overnight—not even in a year or two. This enormous goal has been part of Intel’s journey for many years, and we’re continuing to work with stakeholders across industry, government, and academia. Reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions will require significant research and development, collaboration throughout our value chain, and long-term innovation. 

Every day we continue to make progress toward our environmental goals by focusing on sustainability in several key areas of semiconductor manufacturing. We’re finding new ways to reduce our electricity use, water use, and the waste we generate. We’re driving our value chain toward sustainable computing, and we’re piloting greener chemistry to develop alternatives to the solutions we use to manufacture semiconductors. Intel is leading the industry in sustainable semiconductor manufacturing. Solving the world’s greatest challenges is what we do best, and we are fully committed to doing our part.