Case Study

St George’s Hospital’s new EasiHeat systems run more efficiently than shell-and-tube calorifiers. EasiHeat systems use compact steam-to-hot-water plate heat exchangers (PHEs) to deliver heating and hot water on demand. This eliminates the energy losses from hot water stored in calorifiers. In addition, the EasiHeat plate heat exchangers include a second pass condensate cooler, which helps to condense the steam and encourage more efficient heat transfer.

Maintenance cost savings are also being achieved. As pressure vessels, calorifiers need to be stripped down regularly for insurance inspections - every two years in this case. It’s a time consuming job that calls on maintenance engineers to remove tube bundles weighing up to 300 kg each. EasiHeats are exempt from insurance inspections.

The EasiHeats have also simplified other aspects of the hospital’s maintenance programme.

“Everything is integrated into the EasiHeat systems so we can let Spirax Sarco handle all the planned maintenance,” says a member of the maintenance team at St George’s Hospital. “We don’t have them looking after the heat exchangers and someone else looking after other things, such as the pressure reducing sets. It keeps things simple. The new systems have a much smaller footprint than the old equipment too, leaving us with more space in our plant room.”

Spirax Sarco supplies each EasiHeat system complete with the PHE, controls and other ancillaries mounted together as a pre-fabricated packaged system. The entire assembly is factory tested before it arrives on site, which means less disruption for users during installation and commissioning. Each EasiHeat system is delivered with a touch screen panel, which makes it very easy for maintenance staff to make any adjustments and to check the status of the units.