Enerquip is a leading supplier of pharmaceutical grade stainless steel shell and tube heat exchangers. Our experts understand the quality and precision needed to help our customers perform their life-saving work. We take our role in this process seriously, demonstrated by the highest level of craftsmanship, rigorous in-process inspections and testing and full traceability of our materials.

For decades, we’ve been providing solutions for applications with the toughest operating and regulatory requirements. Leading Clean-in-Place (CIP) and Water-for-Injection (WFI) suppliers in the U.S. have not only been impressed with our quality, but have standardized on Enerquip’s heat exchangers for their systems.

Enerquip’s resourceful team is here to provide you with sizing and design selection assistance. Our skilled sales engineers use state-of-the-art modeling software to recommend the right heat exchanger for each heating or cooling application.

Pharmaceutical-Grade Shell & Tube Heat Exchanger Design

Our engineers participate in ASME-BPE committee meetings to ensure that our talented craftsmen are leading the industry in hygienic design and fabrication. Our cGMP’s and strict tolerances lower the risk of contamination and provide peace-of-mind to our customers.

Standard Pharmaceutical Design Features

Roller Expanded, Seamless Tubes – Enerquip’s pharmaceutical exchangers will have 316L seamless tubes, polished to 25Ra or better. During fabrication, we roller expand the tubes into double-grooved tube sheets and seal weld the tubes in place which enhances stability and contamination prevention.

Surface Finish – As a standard, Enerquip polishes the exterior of our exchangers and insulation jackets to 40Ra, giving your equipment a sanitary look and feel while also enhancing its cleanability. Our in-house electropolishing capabilities ensure your equipment gets the best surface finish available, while allowing us to control cost, quality, and lead-time.

Pitched for Cleanability – Enerquip’s pharmaceutical exchangers are pitched to encourage gravity draining of both sides of the unit. The weep slots incorporated into the pass partitions help to facilitate draining of fluids. Our return pockets and weep slots are also fully radiused and polished to enhance cleanability and drainability. Due to surface tension in highly polished tubes, air or heat may be required to fully drain exchangers.

Upgrades Many Pharmaceutical Customers Choose

Double Tubesheet – Double tubesheets prevent cross-contamination of process fluids between the shell and tubes. The gap between the tube sheets help to minimize stress on the tube-to-tube sheet expansions and allows for leak detection.

Passivation – Our in-house passivation capabilities also ensure your equipment is clean and degreased while enhancing corrosion resistance.

Insulation Jacket – When customers request insulation for their exchangers, Enerquip offers a Thermalux moisture barrier, covered with non-asbestos, chloride free Inswool ceramic insulation material. Our polished pipe jackets are fully welded and polished to a beautiful 40Ra finish. Nozzle covers can be either tack welded stainless sheet or PipeTite boots.

 

Enerquip Pharmaceutical Solutions

Product Heaters & Coolers

Pharmaceutical processing facilities achieve uniform product blending largely due to consistent and accurate product temperature throughout blending operations.

Enerquip shell and tube exchangers offer efficient heat transfer with both large and small batch products, providing consistency in pharmaceutical product heating and cooling. Shell and tube heat exchangers have several advantages over other types of heat exchangers for product heating and cooling in the pharmaceutical industry.

They are designed with stainless steel surfaces that are polished to low Ra finishes, which makes the surfaces resistant to product build-up and easier to clean.

Shell and tube exchangers can process viscous products better than many other types of exchangers. Through a sightglass or with the use of a borescope, shell and tube also allows for easier visual verification of cleaned surfaces than that of a spiral or plate and frame exchanger.

Shell and tube exchangers can be operate safely at much higher (and lower) temperatures than other designs and can be designed to work under vacuum or high pressure conditions.

Shell and tube heat exchangers can be designed in a variety of configurations, such as single pass or multi-pass straight tube units, or multi-pass U-tube units. They can be designed to operate horizontally, inclined, or vertically depending on the space available for installation. There are also many options available for surface finishes, mounting supports, insulation jackets and process and utility connection types.

CIP Systems

To meet the necessary sanitation requirements, pharmaceutical companies will often employ Clean-in-Place (CIP) systems in their plant. A CIP system is designed to remove product residues and microorganisms from inside tanks, pipes, vessels, and process equipment without requiring disassembly.

Why a CIP system in pharmaceuticals?

In pharma grade industries, cleaning and sanitation must be performed at appropriate intervals to prevent fouling, reactions, and cross contamination of different elements.

CIP systems rely on steam or hot water as a heating media for their solutions. Enerquip shell and tube heat exchangers use the heating medium on the shell side of the exchanger to heat this solution as it circulates through the tubes, typically to approximately 185F. The stainless steel CIP heaters are normally designed to the same sanitary standard and with the same surface finish as the equipment that is being cleaned.

A typical CIP system includes multiple cleaning steps. First, an initial rinse releases a controlled amount of water to push the product. Then, CIP solution is circulated and heated to the set temperature. Then the CIP solution is recirculated at the proper temperature, and for the proper amount of time to perform the primary cleaning of the system. The CIP solution is then rinsed once, returned to dispose of initial deposits, and then rinsed again. This critical final rinse ensures that the equipment is perfectly rinsed to pharma-grade standards.

Benefits of a CIP system in pharmaceuticals

There are many benefits to installing a CIP system. CIP systems ensure optimal cleaning results with the lowest consumption of water. In many cases, the solution from the final rinse can be used again for the next cycle’s pre-rinse.

CIP systems also allow for the processing plant to maintain operation during cleaning. While one part of the plant is cleaned, other areas can continue to produce product.

CIP systems minimize manual labor involved in cleaning and enhances safety at the processing plant.

WFI Heating & Cooling in the Pharmaceutical Industry

Uncompromised Water for Injection (WFI) heating and cooling is vital to maintaining the quality and purity of pharmaceutical products. Our experts can ensure your company has the right shell and tube exchangers for this critical element of the safe and effective operation of the manufacturing plant.

In the pharmaceutical industry, water for injection is a sterile, non-pyrogenic distilled water used for the preparation of products typically to be used intravenously or by injection and for the cleaning of those product-contact components.

Once processed, water for injection must meet all of the chemical requirements for purified water as well as bacterial endotoxin specifications.

Because water is prone to endotoxins and microorganisms, equipment and procedures used to create and store water for injection must be designed and fabricated to minimize contamination. The most common preparation techniques of water for injection is distillation and reverse osmosis.

In the distillation process, water goes to a still where it is heated until it is a vapor, stripping it of its heavier ions, particles, and endotoxins. That vapor is then passed through a series of tubes and recondensed back into its liquid form, becoming water for injection.

Enerquip’s shell and tube heat exchangers are pitched to encourage gravity draining of both sides of the unit, making sure proper draining of the unit occurs between each recondensation process.

In the reverse osmosis process, pretreated water is forced through a semi-permeable membrane. The pores in the membrane filter dissolved ions, salts, and organic compounds. Because the membranes can foul easily, it is important to ensure proper pressure and flow rates across membranes.

Once water for injection is made, it is important that it is either used immediately or stored properly. Proper storing of WFI includes keeping it in motion and at high temperatures of around 90 degrees. Our shell and tube heat exchangers play a crucial role in maintaining even temperature of WFI for storing and keeping it in motion. They are also used for heating the WFI up to 185F during recirculation to prevent any contaminants like micro-organisms from forming, and then to cool the WFI back down to the optimum temperature for storage.

Our highly polished, stainless steel exchangers help to ensure there is no contamination in the system, preventing build up and cross-contamination, and allowing for proper draining.

Choosing the right equipment to deliver WFI ensures the desired flow and temperature at the point of use.

Vapor Condenser

Vapor condensers in the pharmaceutical industry are often used with their reactors to capture moisture that is unsafe for the atmosphere.

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