Our Eco-Friendly Facility
Polar’s steadfast commitment to protecting the environment includes the intentional design and continued improvements made to our Bloomington, Minnesota facility. Some recent & past highlights include:
- Remote plasma cleaning & clean gas substitutions
- Reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 35,000 tons per year.
- Photolithography optimization
- Reduces 40,000 pounds of hazardous waste shipped per year.
- Chiller system upgrade
- Reduces 3,500 tons of greenhouse gas emissions per year.
- Water reclaim system
- Reduces 15 million gallons of wastewater discharge per year.
- Pollution control abatement improvements
- Prevents 7 tons of greenhouse gas emissions and 80 tons of hazardous air pollutants per year.
Our Eco-Friendly Facility
Polar’s steadfast commitment to protecting the environment includes the intentional design and continued improvements made to our Bloomington, Minnesota facility. Some recent & past highlights include:
- Epitaxial chamber cleaning optimization
- Reduces chemical waste and offsite emissions by 11,000 pounds per year.
- We etch-spray acid tool optimization
- Reduces sulfuric acid use per wafer by over 40%.
- Wet bench bath life extension
- Reduces hydrofluoric acid use per wafer by over 20%.
- Wastewater treatment optimization
- Eliminates wastewater permit noncompliance events.
- Energy system optimizations (chiller upgrades, heat recovery, and adiabatic humidification):
- Reduces our annual consumption of natural gas and electricity.
2023 Planned Environmental Sustainability Projects
| Project | Environmental Impact |
|
Reduce photolithography developer chemical usage |
Chemical and waste reduction |
|
Replace solvent with aqueous chemical in wet etch processing |
Chemical, waste, and emission (VOC) reduction |
|
Reduce groundwater usage and wastewater discharge |
Water/wastewater reduction |
Interested in Knowing More?
If you’d like to learn more about a specific environmental initiative, we’d be happy to provide you with those details upon request.