Ozone is used for many industrial and semiconductor processing applications including, for example, cleaning semiconductor wafers and the process chambers of semiconductor processing equipment; producing insulating films on semiconductor wafers; and disinfecting water, food, and other consumable or industrial products.
One technique for ozone generation involves a dielectric barrier discharge, where high purity oxygen is exposed to an electrical discharge created by the application of high voltage AC power. The electrical discharge breaks down the oxygen molecules into their atomic state, allowing the oxygen to recombine into a mixture of ozone (O3) and oxygen (O2). For this technique, ozone concentration is proportional to the output power of the ozone generating system. Although increasing output power increases ozone concentration, expectations of performance and reliability and limitations on space provide constraints that are often in opposition.