Water treatment research for microelectronics industry - Electronics and Computers
As devices get smaller and the fabrication plants get larger, the purity of the water required for ultrapure water systems increases. In terms of water reuse, the industry has relatively conservative attitudes towards recycling water for ultrapure water applications, but wastewater is treated and reused for cooling and other less critical purposes. Besides semiconductors, two other silicon-based sectors of the microelectronics industry need large volumes of highly pure water: flat panel displays (FPD) and photovoltaics (PV). Although, both sectors are in the process of maturing we anticipate that the increasing complexity of FPD and PV devices will create demand for even higher purity water.