Valve Manifold Design Within The Pharmaceutical Industry

By John van Loon, Segment Manager Hygienic, Burkert

The pharmaceutical industry, like many others, where the production system relies on processing a range of individual, expensive materials, is in a perpetual pursuit for improved production efficiency and flexibility. Each individual component within the processing environment is assessed for performance and its interoperability with the other components within the system. Every element has the potential to act as an enabler and as a limiter of throughput while also having to meet the increasing demands set by industry safety standards and local legislation.

In this environment, the design and selection of each component within the processing system can be as critical as the design of the overall manufacturing process, but one cannot be considered without assessing the impact on the other. Therefore, it is possible for the efficiency and flexibility of the production plant to be considerably influenced by even a single component within the processing system; control valves and the manifolds they are connected to provide an excellent example.