Re: [asa] Ban on computers reportedly wanted.

Is there a way to check these figures? I have checked other things Janice has posted and found them to be not true or unsubstantiated so I have learned to be cautious. I did some quick calculations (below), and so I am doubtful, ...but also open to learning more if I am missing something.

For the water use figure... 3,787 gallons of waste water
I looked up on google and found a Taiwanese company recently was able to produce 70,000 8 inch wafers per month. (http://www.us.design-reuse.com/news/news8044.html).
So let's say for the sake of argument that they are in production 24 hours a day 30 days per month. That works out to (3,787 x 70,000) / 30 / 24 = 368,180.5 gallons per day per wafer. That's about 102 gallons per second! I find that a little hard to believe...

Similarly, I get these figures translated to usage per second per wafer:

115.2 cubic feet of bulk gases
102.3 gallons of waste water
0.73 pounds of chemicals
0.78 cubic feet of hazardous gases
0.24 pounds of hazardous waste
81.6 gallons of de-ionized water

Am I missing anything here? This does not seem possible. Even if the average company was less efficient, I doubt they would differ by an order of magnitude, and even that seems excessive.

(As an aside, it should be pointed out that a single 8-inch wafer yields a great many computer chips, so the figures would have to be translated to something like "usage per computer produced" to have any real meaning...)
-Paul Greaves
  ----- Original Message -----
  From: Michael Roberts

  Behind the humour there are some serious points.

  Is there anything you or anyone else can do which doesn't pollute?

  Even suicide wont help!

  Michael
    ----- Original Message -----
    From: Janice Matchett

    The little children who have been told that the polar bears are dying because they and their parents are responsible for global warming will reportedly also be told that Algore has decided to call for a ban on computers, videogames, etc., instead of incandescent lightbulbs after he read what I posted below. Pass it on.

    ~ Janice

    "..the very act of manufacturing a computer degrades the environment by using massive amounts of resources-clean water, intensive labor in clean rooms-and producing toxic waste in quantities that far outweigh any potential positive effects that one computer could have on the world.

    In fact, these are the resources used to make one 8-inch wafer:

    4,267 cubic feet of bulk gases
    3,787 gallons of waste water
    27 pounds of chemicals
    29 cubic feet of hazardous gases
    9 pounds of hazardous waste
    3,023 gallons of de-ionized water

    Not only is semiconductor manufacturing the worst air polluting industry, it also uses several million gallons of water a day."

    Excerpted from "Chips Ahoy: The hidden toll of computer manufacture and use," by John C. Ryan and Alan Thein Durning:

    *

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Received on Thu Apr 5 18:34:13 2007