global associates have helped engineer a safe and secure environment in a cutting-edge clean room built within a newly constructed hospital in Wales.
The sterile nature of clean rooms mean they demand a carefully controlled environment in which risk of contamination is kept at an extremely low level. It comes as no surprise therefore that there are strict regulations on how much and what size contaminants are deemed acceptable with cleanliness levels quantified by the number of particles per cubic meter at a predetermined molecule measure.
Standard clean room technologies such as fume cupboards protect operators by preventing them from being exposed to hazardous substances and require precision control systems to operate safely. At the new Welsh medical facility global associates was tasked with providing close control of airflow to maintain pressures inside the clean room, whilst giving the option to link the system with the site-wide main plant equipment if needed. In order to achieve this global selected a Tridium Niagara system and used Modbus to integrate with the variable air volume (VAV) system, providing precise levels of control over airflow and the critical alarms that needed to be incorporated.
Partway through the project the clean room had to be reconfigured so that it could be used to test COVID-19 drugs – a vital operation in the fight against the virus and one that requires a controlled environment to protect personnel and maintain the integrity of the testing process.
Luke Gilbert, Project Manager at global associates, commented: “A project such as this has very specific needs, requiring the utmost care when it comes to design and delivery. In a precision pharmaceutical environment reliability is key and we had to ensure meticulous planning for all eventualities, integrating features such as hardwired interlocks and a high-level interface. Our team was always on hand to ensure that there were no complications and the hospital now has complete control of the clean room environment.”
