Class II Biological Safety Cabinets: Managing a Facility's Total Cost of Ownership

Dave Phillips, Thermo Fisher Scientific

Managing groups of biological safety cabinets (BSCs) in a biomedical research, healthcare, or academic facility requires three strategies to optimize the total cost of ownership. While minimizing use of external exhaust is the top contributing factor to BSC operating costs, proper use of energy-saving features offered by new BSC technology can also play a major role in operating cost savings.

This presentation will address three key strategies for minimizing total operating costs (TCO) for BSCs, which will cover both performance and costs. Additionally, the speaker will present data on annual operating expenses along with a comparison of total cost of ownership over a 15-year period. The speaker will cover:

  • Strategy 1: The right tool for the job: BSCs, clean benches, chemical fume hoods and all other airflow cabinetry are often called "hoods." Although the laboratory hoods are often lumped together, they provide very different types of protection with different cost structures.
  • Strategy 2: Not all BSC users are the same: How the BSC is used is one of the major factors of ongoing costs use.
  • Strategy 3: Timing is everything: The operating costs of BSCs are not evenly distributed over the 15 to 20 years of the BSC life.

Biography:

Dave Phillips began in the biological safety cabinet industry as a technician with a nationwide service company in 1981. In his 26 years with that organization, he served in a variety of roles including technician, regional, and general manager, plus technical support roles, and worked with key accounts including the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He is a member of Controlled Environment Testing Association (CETA); he has served on the Board of Directors and as President in 2002. He was an instructor with the Harvard course on Biological Safety Cabinet (BSC) certification, serves as instructor with the Eagleson Institute, and has helped teach courses at CETA and the annual conference of the American Biological Safety Association. He is on the NSF Joint Committee for NSF/ANSI 49 and is an NSF Accredited BSC Field Certifier.

Since 2007, Dave has worked with the BSC product management team at Thermo Scientific. The team has responsibility for Thermo Scientific BSCs worldwide. One of Dave's key areas of interest is in the BSCs Total Cost of Ownership and improving BSC sustainability.