Patent ID: 8354135

Claim:
A method for regulating a temperature of a thermal processing apparatus during performance of a film deposition therein, the apparatus including: a process chamber capable of accommodating a plurality of objects to be processed; a heating unit configured to heat an inside of the process chamber; a process-gas supply unit configured to supply a process gas into the process chamber; a preheating unit configured to heat a process gas supplied from the process-gas supply unit, before the process gas is supplied into the process chamber; a process-condition storage unit that stores process conditions in accordance with a process content, the process conditions including a temperature of the process chamber heated by the heating unit, a temperature of the process gas heated by the preheating unit, an in-plane uniformity of the process, and an inter-plane uniformity of the process; and a processing unit configured to process the objects to be processed under the process conditions stored in the process-condition storage unit, the method comprising, simultaneously with the film deposition, performing temperature regulating by: a process-gas temperature regulating step, including: a step in which it is judged whether a result of the process performed by the processing unit satisfies the in-plane uniformity of a process stored in the process-condition storage unit; and a step in which, when the in-plane uniformity is judged to be not satisfied, a temperature of the process gas by which the in-plane uniformity can be satisfied is calculated, and the temperature of the process gas is varied to the calculated temperature, and the temperature of the process gas is regulated, such that the objects to be processed are processed under process conditions in which the temperature of the process gas is the calculated temperature; and a process-chamber temperature regulating step, including: a step in which it is judged whether a result of the process performed by the processing unit satisfies the inter-plane uniformity of a process stored in the process-condition storage unit; and a step in which, when the inter-plane uniformity is judged to be not satisfied, a temperature of the process chamber by which the inter-plane uniformity can be satisfied is calculated, and the temperature of the process chamber is regulated such that the objects to be processed are processed under process conditions in which the temperature of the process chamber has been varied to the calculated temperature, one of the process-gas temperature regulating step and the process-chamber temperature regulating step is performed after the other of the process-gas temperature regulating step and the process-chamber temperature regulating step has been performed so as to avoid overlapping of the process-gas temperature regulating step and the process-chamber temperature regulating step.