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LBI-375 375 kg pharmaceutical waste incinerator

A regional destruction point or a manufacturing site running several permitted streams at once — expired finished goods, line-clearance packaging, laboratory waste and denatured controlled drugs through one unit. At 375 kg/h the constraint moves from the machine to how fast quarantine is reconciled, which is where it should be.

See Pharmaceutical Applications
LitBurn LBI-375 pharmaceutical waste incinerator
[LOAD]
375kg
[BURN_RATE]
375kg/h
[DUTY]
Continuous
[WEIGHT]
3.4t
[SPECIFICATION]

LBI-375 In Full

Chamber
9.6 m³
External dimensions
3480 × 2090 × 2280 mm
Burners
3
Loading
Front (dual door)
Operating temperature
850–1,200°C
Gas retention
2.0 s
Ash residue
3–5%
Heat-up time
30 min
Fuel
Natural gas / H₂ / diesel / LPG / bio
Control panel
IP6X rated PLC
Refractory
Coretex lining
Origin
United Kingdom
[SIZING]

Rated Continuously

Throughput is a function of operating hours, not cycles.

At 375 kg/h the machine stops being the constraint on a pharmaceutical site and reconciliation becomes it. That is the right place for the limit to sit, and it is the reason to specify this size rather than a larger one. A regional destruction point taking expired stock from several branches clears a tonne in under three hours, so a day of collections is destroyed the day it arrives and nothing waits overnight in a quarantine store that then has to be secured, logged and re-counted. The 9.6 m³ chamber counts for as much as the rating: it takes full pallets of returned cartons without breaking them down, which removes the handling step that creates both an exposure risk and a diversion opportunity.

Every unit reaches operating temperature within 30 minutes and holds flue gas above 850°C for two seconds in the secondary chamber — the Industrial Emissions Directive condition. Ash residue is 3–5% of input mass.

Specified for

  • Expired & date-lapsed medicinesTablets, capsules, ampoules and creams past their date, destroyed on site against the batch numbers.
  • Recalled & defective productRecalled batches, defective product and falsified stock destroyed under a GMP procedure against the recall reconciliation.
  • Contaminated primary packagingBlister web, foil, liners, bottles and drums carrying active residue — one stream, no separation, no wash-out.
  • R&D laboratory wasteSolvent-wetted consumables, chromatography media, disposable labware, expired reagents and test articles.
  • Cytotoxic & cytostatic wasteChemotherapy residues, contaminated consumables and PPE under 18 01 08* — hazardous, segregated, incineration-only.
  • Controlled drugs destructionDenatured Schedule 2 stock incinerated on site after witnessed destruction, with a cycle log behind the register entry.

Before you specify

Permit

Burning pharmaceutical waste on site requires an environmental permit from the Environment Agency, SEPA or NIEA, and the waste codes have to be named at application. Medicines other than cytotoxic and cytostatic fall under 18 01 09 or 20 01 32; cytotoxic and cytostatic medicines are hazardous under 18 01 08*; manufacturing residues sit in the 07 05 group. A permit written for general waste does not silently cover any of them.

Stack height

Comes out of a site-specific dispersion assessment, not a standard figure.

Full compliance requirements
[WORKED EXAMPLE]

Can the LBI-375 destroy a day of branch collections the same day?

Every figure below is derived from published model data, so it can be checked rather than trusted.

Branches collected
6
Arriving per branch
≈400 kg
Arriving per day
≈2,400 kg
Run time
≈6.4 h
Held overnight
0 kg
Ash at 3–5%
72–120 kg a day

The arithmetic

2,400 kg against the LBI-375's 375 kg/h = about 6.4 hours, so six branches collected in the morning are destroyed inside one working day and nothing goes into the quarantine store overnight.

What to watch

Same-day destruction is what removes the overnight custody problem, not the throughput itself — a store holding reconciled stock overnight has to be secured, logged and re-counted the next morning.

[RANGE]

Rest Of The Pharmaceutical Range

Compare all 13 models
[ALSO CONSIDER]

Same size, other waste types

[FURTHER_READING]

Sizing and background

How to size LitBurn units, and the write-ups behind the figures on this page.

[QUESTIONS]

LBI-375 Questions

Every answer below is derived from this model's published figures, not from a generic range sheet.

The LBI-375 is rated at 375 kg/h continuously, so throughput is a function of how many hours you run it rather than how many cycles you complete. Running it for an eight-hour shift clears roughly 3,000 kg. The 375 kg figure in the model name is the chamber charge, not a daily ceiling.

Continuous. The LBI-375 holds its rated 375 kg/h for as long as it is fed, so you can keep loading through a shift without waiting for a cycle to finish. Fewer, longer burns use less fuel than repeatedly bringing the refractory up from cold.

The LBI-375 is specified for expired & date-lapsed medicines, recalled & defective product, contaminated primary packaging, r&d laboratory waste, cytotoxic & cytostatic waste and controlled drugs destruction. It reaches 850–1,200°C and holds flue gas above 850°C for two seconds in the secondary chamber, which is the Industrial Emissions Directive condition for these streams. Waste containing more than 1% halogenated organic content raises that secondary-chamber minimum to 1,100°C.

The LBI-375 measures 3480 × 2090 × 2280 mm (L × W × H) externally and weighs 3.4 t installed. You need clear working space around it for the front doors to swing and for ash removal, plus a stack whose height comes out of a site-specific dispersion assessment rather than a standard figure.

Yes. Running this unit needs an environmental permit from the Environment Agency in England and Wales, SEPA in Scotland or NIEA in Northern Ireland. The waste codes for pharmaceutical waste have to be named in the application, and a permit written for general waste does not silently cover them. We supply the technical data pack the permit application relies on.

The LBI-375 runs on natural gas, hydrogen, diesel, LPG or biofuel through 3 burners. Being hydrogen-ready matters if you expect to decarbonise the site later: the unit does not need replacing when the fuel supply changes.

Thirty minutes from cold to operating temperature. From there it runs between 850°C and 1,200°C, with a 2.0-second gas retention time in the secondary chamber and a Coretex refractory lining. Control is through an IP6X-rated PLC panel.

Ash residue is 3–5% of input mass, so roughly 95% of what you load stops being a disposal cost. On a 375 kg charge that leaves about 15 kg of ash to remove — the only fraction still attracting gate fees and Landfill Tax.

2,400 kg against the LBI-375's 375 kg/h = about 6.4 hours, so six branches collected in the morning are destroyed inside one working day and nothing goes into the quarantine store overnight. Same-day destruction is what removes the overnight custody problem, not the throughput itself — a store holding reconciled stock overnight has to be secured, logged and re-counted the next morning.

Because the transfer is the part that carries the risk. Once expired stock, a recalled batch or a denatured controlled drug leaves the site it is in someone else's chain of custody, and you are relying on a certificate rather than on having watched it happen. On-site incineration removes the transfer — the material is destroyed where it was quarantined, by staff already inside your quality system, and the certificate is issued against a temperature record you hold.

Yes. The primary chamber runs 850–1,200°C and the secondary holds gas above 850°C for two seconds as standard, rising to 1,100°C where the stream carries more than 1% halogenated organic content. Pharmaceutical charges reach that threshold routinely — PVC and PVdC blister films are the usual reason — so the higher condition should be declared in the permit application rather than treated as an exception.

Yes, and most sites specify it that way. Expired stock, recalled product, contaminated packaging, laboratory waste and denatured controlled drugs all destroy at the same condition, so a single permitted LitBurn covers them provided every stream is named with its waste codes in the application. Cytotoxic and cytostatic waste is the one to check carefully: it is hazardous under 18 01 08* and needs its own permitted scope.

[NEXT_STEP]

Is the LBI-375 the right size?

Send your waste streams and weekly arisings. We will confirm the model, the permit route for your site, and what the disposal-cost case looks like with fuel and capital included.