Geo-spatial prospective life cycle sustainability of InGaN and InGaP compound semiconductors.

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Environmental Science
• Industrial Ecology

Background:

• Compound semiconductors like Indium Gallium Nitride (InGaN) and Indium Gallium Phosphide (InGaP) are critical for advanced electronics.
• Assessing their environmental footprint across global supply chains is essential for sustainable manufacturing.

Purpose of the Study:

• To conduct the first integrated geo-spatial life cycle and supply chain sustainability modeling for InGaN and InGaP.
• To evaluate 80 international supply chain scenarios across 11 countries and four time horizons (2024-2050).

Main Methods:

• Utilized geo-spatial prospective life cycle assessment (LCA) and supply chain modeling.
• Incorporated 80 international scenarios, 11 countries, and four future time horizons (2024, 2030, 2040, 2050).

Main Results:

• Environmental sustainability is geographically and temporally dependent, with UK-based manufacturing showing significant impact reduction.
• Scenarios in the UK, US, and Taiwan demonstrate increasing sustainability potential, while China-based scenarios show higher impacts.
• All scenarios show reduced environmental impacts due to grid decarbonization and improved controls, though epitaxial growth and substrate preparation remain hotspots.

Conclusions:

• Reshoring or nearshoring compound semiconductor fabrication to regions with cleaner energy (UK, US, Taiwan) is supported by sustainability gains.
• Process innovation, cleaner precursors, and advanced recycling are crucial for further reducing environmental hotspots.
• InGaN generally outperforms InGaP due to simpler inputs and lower toxicity, though InGaP shows better ozone depletion performance.