The EU Genesis project redefines and advances the sustainability trajectory across the semiconductor production industry, addressing PFA, emissions, critical raw materials, and circulation.
The microchip production industry is undergoing major transformation. As digital technology evolves at a fierce speed, the environmental impact of manufacturing chips that enhance them will undoubtedly need to be improved at high speeds. At the heart of this challenge is Genesis, a green, environmentally neutral, environmentally friendly, sustainable, integrated semiconductor. This is a three-year Horizon Europe project launched in May 2025, shaping the next generation of microelectronics innovations.
Genesis stands for Generate in Europe Sustainable Manufacturing for Semiconductor and brings together 58 partners across Europe, including global industry leaders, research institutes, small and medium-sized enterprises, industry associations, and environmental experts. Its mission is clear. It is to develop and demonstrate practical and scalable solutions that reduce hazardous substances, emissions and material waste in microchip production without compromising performance, innovation or global competitiveness.
Genesis is part of the Chip JU project for the Horizon Europe programme, jointly funded by the EU, member states and the Swiss state secretariat of Education, Research and Innovation (SERI). Through the CEA-Leti Institute in France led by CEA, the project consists of six work areas, four focusing on key aspects of sustainable manufacturing. Genesis will run until early 2028, but its ambition is to leave behind a lasting legacy, a blueprint for the production of cleaner, smarter, and more cyclical microchips over the next decades.
Technical overview of Genesis’s ambition
The Four Pillars of Genesis
At the heart of Genesis is a comprehensive sustainability framework built on four interconnected pillars, each guided by a dedicated pillar and supported by a professional partner.
Pillar 1 – Monitoring and Sensing
This pillar focuses on real-time emissions of air and liquid waste to ensure tracking, tracking and monitoring via process feedback systems. Semiconductor fabs release important greenhouse gases, particularly from process gases such as NF₃, CF4, and SF6. Genesis develops a new generation of monitoring technology that can detect, quantify and control emissions along the process chain, enabling the transition to a transparent emissions fab tailored to the EU CL goals. This pillar is led by CSEM.
Pillar 2 – New Materials
With increasing global restrictions on PFA, there is an urgent need for sustainable material alternatives. Genesis designs and qualifies PFAS alternative chemistry and low GWP alternatives for advanced semiconductor processes such as lithography, etching, cleaning and deposition. These next-generation materials are being tested for performance, safety and compatibility in industrial environments, as a pillar led by IMEC.
Pillar 3 – Minimizing waste
By operating a wide range of gases and wet chemistry, semiconductor manufacturing generates complex waste streams. The pillar focuses on innovations to improve the global reduction efficiency of air and aqueous waste flows, and also by driving new solutions in terms of gas recycling, reuse, slurry and solvents. By implementing closed-loop systems and recovery technologies, Genesis aims to significantly reduce waste throughout the Fab ecosystem. This pillar is led by the Fraunhofer Institute.
Pillar 4 – Important Raw Materials Relaxation
Europe’s dependence on key raw materials (CRMs) such as gallium, indium and rare earth elements poses both economic and geopolitical risks. Genesis addresses this challenge by developing strategies to reduce CRM dependencies through two different axes of exchange or reduction of CRM materials through process integration alternatives complemented by new circular strategies that enhance both environmental sustainability and supply chain resilience. This pillar is led by degri degli Studi, University of Vergata.
Industry demonstrations and verification
Innovation is only important when it comes to changing the real world as a result. Therefore, Genesis is committed to demonstrating its technology through pilot lines hosted by industry and research partners. These live and on-site demonstrations validate environmental performance, process integration, and scalability, ensuring that innovation is not only technically sound, but also of industrially viable origins.
Vision of Dissemination
Building long-term impacts beyond 2028
Genesis is designed not only as a project but as a platform for permanent conversions. From the beginning, the consortium has been working to ensure that the results continue to have an impact beyond the project’s lifecycle.
Strategic contributions to European technology leadership
Genesis is more than just a green initiative. This is a flagship project that promotes Europe’s long-term leadership in microelectronics. As the European Union advances the EU chips Act and investigates the development of Chips Act 2.0, projects like Genesis ensure that sustainability is already incorporated into the future of unbolted microchips production as an afterthought.
Through pioneering work on sustainable materials, real-time emission monitoring, circular manufacturing, and policy adjustment, Genesis diagrams the paths that are not only powerful and accurate, but also environmentally respectful, circular and ecological design-based paths.
In an age where climate action, digital sovereignty and sustainable growth must be closely linked, Genesis offers more than technology.
We provide models of responsible innovation built in Europe for the world. It shows how to extend semiconductor functionality without compromising environmental and social goals.
The project’s ambitions also involve four important complementary dissemination actions.
Industrial Intake Support
Each partner is developing individual exploitation plans (IEPs) that detail how Genesis results can be used, expanded and integrated, including internal innovation pipelines, commercial applications, licensing models, or further research collaborations. This bottom-up strategy ensures that Genesis results are integrated into the operational and strategic frameworks of the entire European ecosystem.
Embedded Policy Relevance
The project will work closely with the development of EU regulations to support European green trading, Reach PFAS restrictions and key raw materials law goals. Through its regulatory and outreach efforts coordinated by Semi-Europe and supported by an embedded external expert committee, Genesis aims to provide policymakers with valuable insights and to promote ongoing dialogue on sustainable semiconductor regulation and standardization.
Promotion of open science and education
Genesis output from technical data to environmental assessments is published via an open access platform, following Horizon Europe’s principles of transparency. Educational content is tailored to the university’s curriculum and training programmes, allowing the next generation of engineers, scientists and decision makers to build on the foundations of Genesis.
Through active publications, conferences, events, roundtables and conference participation, Genesis ensures that the findings are amplified across the international microelectronics community. These platforms provide long-term continuity and impact, and link project innovation to the global sustainability agenda.
Towards a sustainable semiconductor future
Genesis is setting stages for new models of semiconductor manufacturing. This recognizes that performance and sustainability must evolve together. It not only asks how to reduce the environmental footprint of microelectronics, but also shows how environmental responsibility can be a driving force behind innovation.
Through science, collaboration and real-world verification, Genesis proves that Europe can lead the world not only in technical terms but also in sustainable microelectronics.
This article will also be featured in the 23rd edition of Quarterly Publication.
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