Haat has supplied quite a large number of incinerators for biomedical waste within the country and abroad in the last 20 years.  During this time, we have observed some very interesting aspects in incinerator design and in doing business  with particular reference to other incinerator companies and prices.  Globally our observations are as follows:

1.      Many manufacturers design the systems much smaller than required.  The combustion engineer knows that when waste is ignited the quantum of flue gas generated is several times more than the quantity of waste.

The primary chamber should be large enough to accommodate such a high volume of flue gas within itself.  The secondary chamber should be designed for 2 seconds residence time considering the total volume of flue gas generated in the primary chamber as well as in the secondary.

2.      Many manufacturers design the chamber very conservatively to cut costs.  This results in incomplete combustion, poor emissions and unsatisfactory performance.

3.      We do not make any compromise in volume of the machine or its performance and hence we do not always get the business when people compare apples to oranges.

This leads us the question what price, quality?

When you buy on price you can never be sure.  It is unwise to pay too much, but it is worse to pay too little.  When you pay too much, you lose a little more money, but when you pay too little, you sometime lose everything.  This would be because the incinerator you bought is “incapable of doing what it was bought to do”.

Quality of raw materials used

We buy new unused steel straight from the mill for fabrication.  We do not under any circumstances compromise on this. 

Not only that, we also make sure that the material we buy is traceable to the production line in the steel plant.  Additionally our own QC department has the material chemically analysed and tested for its mechanical properties. 

When it comes to the lining material, namely castable refractory, we use the best in the business.  Of course this is customized as per our requirement where the strength of the lining goes up to 1000 kg/cm² at a temperature 1000°C whereas standard conventional castable refractories fail at this temperature.  They are definitely insulation properties, but there is practically no strength at such high temperature.  This means that such a good refractory material therefore is expensive but if one goes back in history, one will find some of our incinerators are working from 15 to 20 years without any need for any relining.  On the contrary, cheaper refractory results requires frequent relining which of course the customer is forced to spend because he has invested quite a bit in the total system.  Our maintenance costs are practically zero.

Bought outs

We buy lot of items like instruments such as thermocouples, temperature controllers, temperature transmitters, pressure transmitters, level transmitters, flow transmitters, electrical items like control panels, junction boxes, cables, cable trays and so on.  All are from reputed manufacturers whose instrument reliability comes at a premium.  This is the reason why some of our systems in difficult hazardous areas like Oil and Gas Drilling sites, Petro products, Deserts, etc. have lasted considerably longer than our own estimates.

MOC

Of certain equipment, no compromise is made on the quality of the material used.  For example, anchor keys in the whole refractory are ASI 309 or 310, the venturi is invariably SS316L, the mist eliminator and chimneys are always rubber lined.

We do not use any other lower grade material as we know that it will have a limited life and will lead to total customer dissatisfaction.

Design of tall chimneys

We do not make the chimney unless and until we have soil data and wind loads in the respective sites.  With this information, our structural engineer calculates the thickness, diameter, etc. of the chimney and its structural supports before we start fabrication of this.  Due to the time and effort spent in chimney design, we have never had an instance of one of our 30-m chimneys falling while in service.

These are some of the points a buyer should consider.  By paying the right price for the incinerator that he is buying from Haat, he can rest assured about the quality of the incinerator in disposing of his medical waste with clean emissions with an overall life of between 15 – 20 years.