[labnetwork] Plea for Peer Review - Point of Use Abatement (pyrophoric) systems

[Tom Britton]

Hi Michael,

You should really look at a dry bed system for this. The Jupiter Callisto is used by many of your fellow Universities and doesn’t need to be cleaned out. You run to it until the canister tells you it is time for a change, and then you wheel it out and wheel in a new one. Veolia or Clean Harbors can take pick these up and incinerate them for you. No operator exposure, minimal utilities, no water or fuel. The canisters now have a DOT rating on them so you can ship them on a pallet without putting them in a hazardous waste container first.

I can call you to discuss if you would like.

Thanks sir,

Tom

Tom Britton
Director of Sales
Critical Systems, Inc.
Direct: 208-890-1417
Office: 877-572-5515
www.CriticalSystemsInc.com<http://www.criticalsystemsinc.com/>

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From: labnetwork-bounces at mtl.mit.edu [mailto:labnetwork-bounces at mtl.mit.edu] On Behalf Of Michael Khbeis
Sent: Thursday, April 06, 2017 6:17 AM
To: labnetwork at mtl.mit.edu
Subject: [labnetwork] Plea for Peer Review - Point of Use Abatement (pyrophoric) systems

Colleagues,

I continue to rely on and value your assistance in making the case or finding alternative resolution to issues imposed by unilateral decisions my campus construction folks are making and forcing upon us. Most recently, an 11th hour submittal of this EDOC local abatement unit (3-4 in total - see operating manual attachment) in lieu of running 5 - 1.5" forelines from the pumps to the existing CDO burn box. These units mix air into the effluent stream to facilitate pyrolysis and collect the dust until they clog at which time, my personnel are supposed to wear full PPE and respiratory protection and open up and scrape, vacuum, and even chisel the inside of the boxes clean. As per the attached manual, all the constituents would be considered hazardous.

My issues are that the construction folks and this vendor haven't done a thorough hazard review. We are running diborane, phosphine, and MOCVD precursors in addition to silane.

I am concerned about scraping phosphine residue as when I was a HAZMAT tech, I personally experienced spontaneous combustion when scraping phosphorus residue from an implanter (and simultaneously experienced the ill effects of when people don't review potential hazards before sending people into harms way).

Furthermore, the MOCVD precursors are particularly nasty - for example I watched a used VCR gasket that was exposed to CUPRASELECT spontaneously start to fizz, corrode, and jump around on the base of the tool as soon as it was exposed to air. Now this proposal suggests that we purposely expose this material to air. The vendor doesn't even have a list of the liquid precursors we are using - because they didn't even request it to do a hazard review.

Finally, even if I get my folks HAZWOPR certified to do abatement, have them fully geared, the units are open to my service chase and would potentially have these hazardous dusts in the recirculating air flow path. When I agreed to localized abatement - I meant something like an Edwards GRC that has a cartridge that captures the byproducts not something that hangs onto it and dumps it out on the floor once it clogs and we open it.

Finally, the vendor claims it would require service about once every 6 months but that of course we would need to establish a statistical idea of how often they need service based on our use. Given that in the recent past, we clogged a foreline in <2 years by sharing with multiple tools (so silane and oxygen were doing this in the unions), I'm assuming that we will be generating a decent amount of sand and likely need to clean out more often. Even then, if I use the 6 month PM figure - that's 8 HAZMAT remediations a year. If we hire out a company like Clean Harbors in lieu of putting my staff in harms way - that's a serious additional expense we would have to adsorb.

I certainly don't want to be close minded so if you have experience with these or similar units and can enlighten me on the realistic operating and mitigation conditions, I'd be happy to hear the feedback.

Most gratefully,

Dr. Michael Khbeis
Washington Nanofab Facility
University of Washington
Fluke Hall, Box 352143
(O) 206.543.5101<tel:206.543.5101>
(C) 443.254.5192<tel:443.254.5192>
khbeis at uw.edu<mailto:khbeis at uw.edu>
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