Hi John, Pat, Imran and others,
Thanks for your input.
My point was to break the traditional silo thinking betweencold chain, local storingin fridges and distribution/logistics & fleetin a technical way.
Vaccine supply chain (and certainly health supply chain in general) will be more resilient, efficient, effective, and sustainable if the cold chain strategy is holistic (not only @ service delivery point with fridges), reinforce flexibility of connected steps in the supply chain (in refrigerated distribution/logistics, refrigerated storing orrefrigerated equipment for outreach), introduce new technology with reasonnable investment, etc. Or at least this is how we can see modern supply chain moving beyond classic thinking and provide additional value.
These active containers can be plugged on a normal electric outlet (if available) when the car does not run (at night). Alternatively, the car engine can be kept running. In ice cream or meat industries, these arrangments have been proved successful, especially for cross docking and night stops.
Given the extreem price of a refrigerated truck, I believe this is a doable, flexible solution.
Best regards,
Pierre
John Lloydreplied to the discussion[#3950] Car battery operated cold boxes
2016/02/19 09:25am
Hi Pierre!
The main advantage of active refrigeration v. passive cold box is the vaccine capacity v. external volume of the container…ie you can transport much more vaccine in the space available in a vehicle. Maybe you could also argue that the duration of the trip could be longer than 5 days (limit of passive container). But which campaigns last more than a week?.
But one needs to consider the potential issues also:
running from the vehicle battery can/will drain it below starting needsrunning an ancillary battery challenges the alternator (shorter life)transporting active refrigerators causes them to fail if the road is rough and they are not bolted to the bodythe condenser needs free ventilation: the back of a vehicle is frequently heavily loaded (a problem particularly with skin condenser)
These points are from experience, but ‘old’ experience!!! So this not meant to discourage, just things to check! Main one is «Do you really need it?!»
Best wishes,
John
Pat Lennonreplied to the discussionCar battery operated cold boxes
2016/02/18 18:42pm
Hi Imran - Two questions that will help inform technology selection and specfication. How long do you need to keep vaccines cold and/or water packs frozen for these extended outreach sessions you are thikning of? What is the volume of vaccine and/or water packs one would need to carry for these sessions?
Hi Pierre - I don't have much experience with the devices you describe so I'll just throw out some thoughts that might be helpful. I looked at the information on the web site you linked and I would want to have a better understanding of holdover. For a long trip the standard unmodified vehicle would likely not be running 24hours a day - so when the vehicle is not running and therefore not charging it's own battery or providing power to the cold box active cooling technologyit would be good to know how long the device can keep contents at the appropriate temperature. If the device requires power to maintain temperatures overnight (for example) one would need to determine power draw so as not to inadvertently drain the car batteryleaving the team stranded and/or vaccines too hot. If the device could maintain temperatures for an extended period (at least overnight?) without needing to draw power from the vehicle (internal battery and/or sufficient insulation) AND could recharge itself within the typical car engine run-time for the outreach tripit could be a feasible technology to test out.
My understanding/experience is standard car batteries will not hold up to repeated draining- a deep-cycle battery would need to be included if the technology was relying on the vehicle to provide power when the vehicle's engine wasn't running for extended periods.