CO{sub 2}-based supercritical fluids as environmentally-friendly processing solvents

The production of integrated circuits involves a number of discrete steps that utilize hazardous or regulated solvents. Environmental, safety and health considerations associated with these chemicals have prompted a search for alternative, more environmentally benign, solvent systems. An emerging technology for conventional solvent replacement is the use of supercritical fluids based on carbon dioxide (CO{sub 2}). Supercritical CO{sub 2} (SCCO{sub 2}) is an excellent choice for IC manufacturing processes since it is non-toxic, non-flammable, inexpensive, and is compatible with all substrate and metallizations systems. Also, conditions of temperature and pressure needed to achieve the supercritical state are easily achievable with existing process equipment. The authors first describe the general properties of supercritical fluids, with particular emphasis on their application as alternative solvents. Next, they review some of the work which has been published involving the use of supercritical fluids, and particularly CO{sub 2}, as they may be applied to the various steps of IC manufacture, including wafer cleaning, thin film deposition, etching, photoresist stripping, and waste treatment. Next, they describe the research work conducted at Los Alamos, on behalf of Hewlett-Packard, on the use of SCCO{sub 2} in a specific step of the IC manufacturing process: the stripping of hard-baked photoresist