Protecting your contents and facility….

Cost effective, proactive fire protection is the priority of any Clean Room site:

• Semiconductors/Wafer Fabs.

• Electronic Device Manufacturing.

• Research, Development and Manufacturing

Facilities.

• Process, Assembly & Storage Areas.

By installing an early warning smoke

detection system that addresses the:

a) High air velocity.

b) ‘Class’ of cleanliness.

d) Sophisticated process and utility equipment.

e) Temperature, humidity and particle density of a clean room site.

Protecting your contents and facility….

Reduce the threat of fire……..

• Ready supply of oxygen;

• Electronic process equipment e.g. wet benches;

• Flammability & explosive nature of manufacturing materials;

• Heat transfer/flame spread;

• Production of toxic & corrosive gases.

Protecting your contents and facility….

Clean Room Fire Risks……..

Major Fire Protection Challenges of Cleanrooms

• Ultra clean environment

• High air exchange rates

• Laminar air flow

• HEPA filter considerations

• Common return air paths

• Accessibility for Maintenance

• The direction and high volume of airflow is a major obstacle to detecting smoke in a clean room.

• Conventional ‘passive’ smoke detection such as photo-electronic and ion detectors can only identify visible smoke.

Protecting your contents and facility….

• The delayed detection of smoke not only compromises the sterile environment, but causes irreversible damage to the clean room, the equipment and manufactured product.

• Installing an aspirating ‘active’ smoke detection system is the best way to avoid a clean room fire.

Protecting your contents and facility….

• VESDA detects smoke particles at the incipient (1st) stage - providing the earliest possible warning of fire.

• The incipient stage provides the widest opportunity to detect and control the spread of fire - avoiding the incidence of facility and content loss.

Protecting your contents and facility….

Protecting your contents and facility….

Damage and/or loss of facility and contents is inevitable once Stage 3 (flaming stage) is reached.

• Earliest detection and programmable reporting.

• Multiple alarm levels customised to individual site parameters provides:

1) Reduced incidence of over-sensitivity & false alarms.

2) Accurate interpretation of a facilitys’ unique environmental inputs, i.e. smoke, raised temperature.

Protecting your contents and facility….

VESDA’s Advanced Technology

Determines the best fire protection systemby assessing the:• Function

• Risk Factors

• Internal configuration and environment of a specific site

• VESDA’s very early warning detection technology provides optimal protection by addressing the individual fire risk of the equipment and the overall fire risk of the clean room.

Protecting your contents and facility….

Performance-Based Design

Market History

• Loss History Data – Factory Mutual 10-year period prior to 1995

$8.0 million average

1:10Semiconductor

$300,000

average1:100Average

Loss ValueLoss RatioIndustry Type

Led to development of FMRC 4910 Protocol and FM DS 7-7

The incidence of smoke dilution and delayed

detection is reduced by:

• Locating the sampling pipe in the direct line of the airflow.

• Locating the sampling pipe in close proximity to the identified risk (i.e. electronic equipment).

Protecting your contents and facility….

Installation Considerations

• Installing shorter sampling pipe increases the response time to a potential fire.

• A detectors’ efficiency is proportional to the air exchange rate and volume of space of the protected area.

• External pollution may enter the airflow via the fresh air make-up supply.

• Installation of a reference detector can compensate for the introduction of external air.

Protecting your contents and facility….

Installation Considerations

Fab Protection Requirements

• FM DS 7-7 “Semiconductor Fabrication Facilities”– 2.2.1.4 A Factory Mutual Research Approved air-sampling or

linear beam smoke detection system should be provided within the return air path…

• FM DS 1-56 “Cleanrooms”– 2.3.1.4 Provide an Approved air-sampling or linear beam

smoke detection system within the return air path…

• NFPA 318 “Cleanrooms”– 2.3.1 A listed or approved smoke detection system shall be

provided in the cleanroom return airstream at a point before dilution from make-up air occurs. The system shall have a minimum sensitivity of 0.03% per ft. obscuration.

Design Objectives

1. Detect Incipient Fire Condition

2. Prevention of False Alarms

3. Locate Detection where smoke travels

4. Low installation costs

5. Maintenance of system

1. Detect Incipient Fire Condition

Problem:

Failure of component can result in slow fire growth that will emit smoke particles.

Solution:

VESDA’s high sensitivity can detect this smoke.

Performance:

Hot Wire Test and detect within 120 seconds

2. The Prevention of False Alarms

• Four alarm levels allows for investigation before the need to evacuate at early stage.

• Time delays at each alarm level

• Filter to remove particulate matter that may cause unwanted alarms

• Good design and installation

3. Locate Detection where smoke travels

Clean Room Sampling Locations

Design 1 Design 2

Fresh Air Fresh Air

Ceiling Void

Clean Room

Sub Fab Area

UPS Power Room Optional roof space sampling

VESDA LaserCOMPACT

Detection Criteria

• Primary Detection - Where smoke will travel when Air Conditioning is operating

• Secondary Detection - Where smoke will travel when Air Conditioning is not operating.

• There are several primary sampling locations within a clean room facility.

• Key factors such as environmental requirements, internal configuration and airflow direction determine the positioning of sampling pipe.

• Primary sampling locations are underneath the clean room false floor and in the sub-fab area.

Protecting your contents and facility….

Clean Room Sampling Locations

• Positioning sampling pipe directly under the false floor (floor void) provides the earliest detection of fire, especially within the process equipment.

Floor Void Sampling

Process Equipment e.g. Wet Bench

Pre- Filter

Sampling Holes

Floor Void

Provide Smoke Location

• By locating smoke detection under the fab floor smoke location can be determined.

• We recommend maximum 500sqm per zone.

• Locating the sampling pipe across the Dry Coil Unit allows direct sampling prior to the air being re-circulated back into the clean room.

Dry Coil Sampling

Dry Coil Unit

To low pressure side of Unit

VESDA SAMPLING PIPE ACROSS RETURN AIR IS EFFECTIVE WITHIN HIGH AIRLOW ENVIRONMENTS

4. Low installation costs

• Compared to Point Type Detection VESDA is EASY to INSTAL Across Return Air Path

5. Maintenance of system

• Change VESDA Filter every 3-4 Years

• No field calibration required

• Pipes can be cleaned at detector using compressed air

Semiconductor Equipment

• Critical Process Equipment– Ion Implanters– Photolithography– Stockers– Spin Coaters– Wet Benches– Furnaces

• High Asset Value

• High Production Value

• HIGH RISK to Production if Fire Occurs

• SEMI Guideline recommends the protection of these process tools

NEW SEMI Standards

• SEMI S14-0200– “Safety Guidelines for Fire Risk Assessment and Mitigation

for Semiconductor Manufacturing Equipment”• Applies to new equipment used to manufacture, measure, assembly, & test

semiconductor products located in fab.

• Requires Fire Risk Assessment – Fire Exposures

• Materials of construction (combustible components)• Combustible electronics• Combustible & Flammable Liquids/Gases • Ignition Sources

– Lasers, Heaters, Transformers

– Power Connectors, Terminal Strips

– Business Interruption & Downtime• Replacement Time• Contamination

Ion Implanters

Exposures•Large Power Supplies•Oil-filled transformers•Combustible Construction•Retrofits

Varian - Customer Requirements

• VERY early warning at a localized level– Severe fire exposure – Limit smoke damage and contamination

• Conventional spot detector problems– While previously installed were ineffective in high air

flow environments– Inaccessible when implanter is in operation

• ASSD implemented as standard equipment– Upgrade retrofit packages available

• Recommended protection– Factory Mutual DS 7-7 Section 2.5.13.2.4

recommends ASSD for all ion implanters– New and existing

Varian Solution

Stepper

• Bottleneck of fab– High Asset Value– Very High Production Value

• Very Sensitive Manufacturing Process– Sensitive Environmental Chamber– Sensitive Optics & Alignment– Large power supply

• Recommended Protection– Factory Mutual DS 7-7 Section 2.5.8– Internal air sampling smoke detection is recommended for

all steppers.– Gaseous suppression is recommended in some cases.

Stocker Exposures

• Heart of IC Fab– Extremely High Value

• Damage & Downtime

• All WIP & FP wafers

– Reticle stockers included

• Fire Exposure– High combustible loading

• Storage of combustible foups or pods (plastic wafer carriers)

• Recommended Protection– Factory Mutual DS 7-7 Section 2.5.16

• “Gaseous suppression systems (& FWS) should by actuated preferably by Air Sampling Smoke Detection system located in the air plenum of the stocker”

– Alternative to suppression?

Stocker Protection

• Sampling pipe provided beneath stocker for total protection

• Detector located outside stocker for testing and maintenance

• Can be interfaced with remote monitoring or suppression system

Sampling PipeSampling Pipe

AirflowAirflow

CYMER - Laser Illumination Photolithography Systems

Detector located at vent

box to cover entire tool.

Air IntakeAir Intake

ExhaustExhaust

Summary

• Benefits of Air Sampling Smoke Detection:

– High Sensitivity enables the detection of diffused smoke

– Innovative sampling arrangements are possible

– Detectors can be positioned for easy maintenance

– Multiple Alarm Levels over a wide smoke detection range

– Time Delays can be set on each alarm level

– Can be integrated with Suppression Systems

– Are easily adapted to connect to Fire Indicator Panels

– Provides protection of critical equipment

Protecting your contents and facility….

Major Clean Rooms protected by VESDA’s optimum smoke detection system include:

• Motorola, US

• Seagate Semiconductors, Nth Ireland

• AT & T Microelectrics, Thailand

• Applied Materials Inc. USA

• Peregrine Semiconductors, NSW - Aus.

• Samsung, Korea

• Pfizer, Kent - UK

• Honeywell Microswitch, USA

Protecting your contents and facility….

VESDA - the smart solution for optimum fire protection in Clean

Rooms.