Elkton, MD (June 29, 2010)—W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc. (Gore) is offering a new family of highly efficient cartridge filters that improve water quality and reduce total cost of filtration for ultrapure water (UPW) and de-ionized (DI) water used in the manufacture of semiconductors and silicon wafers.

Gore has used its expertise in ePTFE materials and membrane technology to engineer a family of filters that offer 3x the flow rate of best-in-class filters without sacrificing particle retention, and that can be easily substituted for filters in the field that no longer meet performance or cost requirements. They also can provide a more economical alternative to ultrafiltration (UF) modules.

Applications include a US semiconductor fab that replaced its Nylon pre-filters with GORE 0.01 µm filters in its UPW facility. The high flow rate of the GORE® Filters enabled the manufacturer to replace 840 10-inch equivalents with only 210, reducing their total cost of filtration by more than 50%.

TSMC Shanghai has demonstrated that the GORE® HR (high retention) filters provide a significantly lower-cost alternative (50% less capital expenditure) to ultrafiltration modules and will meet the needs for most ultrapure water systems.

A major semiconductor manufacturer in Asia has replaced a large-pore-size guard filter with GORE® 0.1 µm filters -- instead of installing an additional skid of expensive UF filters -- to address periodic water quality problems, provide protection against system upsets, and reduce baseline counts during normal operations.

GORE® Filters incorporate Gore’s proprietary high-flow ePTFE (expanded polytetrafluoroethylene) filtration media. Gore technology has been used for decades in the world’s best-performing filters for semiconductor, electronics, high-purity chemical and pharmaceutical applications.
For more information on Gore’s family of cartridge filters for ultrapure water (UPW) and de-ionized (DI) water facilities, visit gore.com/filters.

About W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc.

With more than $2.5 billion in annual sales and 8,000 employees in over 45 facilities worldwide, W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc., provides diverse, high-performance solutions in consumer, industrial, electronic, medical, and surgical markets. As well-known for its unique corporate culture as for its products, Gore’s 50-year success story rests equally on product and organizational innovation. Gore is one of only four companies included in every selection of Fortune Magazine’s “100 Best Companies to Work For” since the list began in 1984. Perhaps best known as the inventors of expanded PTFE (ePTFE) and the makers of GORE-TEX® fabric, Gore is a leading manufacturer of thousands of advanced technology products that comprise a breadth of capabilities.

Contact

Lisa Mullinax
(410) 506-5556
lmullina@wlgore.com
gore.com/filters