Process Cooling is Critical in Optimizing Manufacturing for Life Sciences and Industrial Facilities

Source: Trane

Process cooling addresses latent heat, ventilation, and space cooling. For manufacturing and life sciences, this is critical to maintaining "razor thin ambient tolerances tech plants have to maintain. There's no room for temperature swings and there's no time for downtime." (source)

What matters in process cooling?

What matters to process cooling users depends on several contributing factors, including environmental conditions, industry requirements, applications, and the following (source):

1. Reliability – Is the system designed with product performance and reliability as top priority? Does it perform reliably and with minimal downtime? How quickly and effectively can it be serviced when required? Are maintenance services available and reliable? Is the supply chain for parts and services diversified and secure?

2. Costs – These systems are not inexpensive, so will they run efficiently, minimize the opportunity cost of downtime and produce energy cost savings? Is cost modeling available to help predict energy costs? Are preventative maintenance schedules available to avoid repair and downtime costs and suggest the best maintenance plan? Are predictive analytics available to help save money and time, and improve productivity?

3. Support of business needs – How knowledgeable is the manufacturer from an industry and domain perspective? Are they active in ASHRAE® and well-versed in LEED, Energy Star and other industry standards? Does the manufacturer offer a broad range of products or are they focused on only a few? Are the products designed with Industry 4.0 compatibility in mind? Where are service technicians and spare parts depots located? Can the manufacturer support global projects and systems? Are the systems operationally secure?

4. Meeting sustainability goals – Are systems and products designed with sustainability principles in mind? How does decarbonization factor into the manufacturers’ products and services? How energy-efficient are the products? Are the systems designed to conserve water?

Real World Translations of Process Cooling Dimensions Across Industries

1. In the Life Sciences world, when COVID-19 erupted, vaccine makers needed to ramp up their development and scale manufacturing processes to be first to the market and increase revenues more quickly. To do so, they needed to have complete reliability in their equipment.

2. Semiconductor companies are in a race to build chip fabrication capacity and win market share; they need reliable, industry-leading HVAC equipment delivered on time, from a trusted partner.

3. Electric vehicle manufacturers are also in stiff competition to gain market share and help the environment. They cannot afford to have processes and systems that are rigid, inflexible, unreliable and slow. Likewise, food and beverage manufacturers must have constant precision monitoring of their environments and operations to avoid product contamination and costly recalls.

All these industries rely on effective and efficient process cooling in their manufacturing facilities. As they look to mitigate risk in all facets of their operations, predictive analytics, connected services, and remote maintenance can be used to maximize uptime more effectively.

Predictive analytics can also help drive planned maintenance events that are cost-effective, less frequent, and shorter in duration. Remote monitoring and diagnostics use digital twins of equipment to help spot potential failures faster so critical parts can be on hand to avoid costly downtime. Boland provides equipment rental capabilities to step in with solutions that accelerate deployment or keep operations going if issues occur.

No matter where you are in your journey, we are here to help you plan and provide optimal design solutions for your business.