A heated non-contact wafer handling gripper may heat a thin device wafer bottom surface having a temporary bonding adhesive residue after debonding of the device wafer from a carrier along a layer of temporary bonding adhesive that bonds the wafers. The gripper may heat residue of the adhesive that remains on the bottom surface while gripping, transferring and placing the wafer onto an adhesive cleaning chuck. The heated adhesive cleaning chuck may heat the thin device wafer bottom surface having the adhesive residue after being placed on the chucks. The chuck may heat the residue of the adhesive while the residue is cleaned from the wafer. Due to the heating by the chuck and/or gripper, wafer warpage and associated problems due to cooling of the residue may be eliminated or acceptable for wafer handling and adhesive cleaning.