#101 Why does it work in the lab? The story of the scale-up effect

The difficulty of scaling up is best understood through cooking.

This is about the relationship between surface area and volume, known as the 'scale-up effect.' When you try to heat or cool a 1-liter mixture from the lab in a vessel holding several thousand liters, heat transfer becomes inefficient. Much like cooking in a large pot where the temperature inside takes longer to rise, this difference in heat distribution is a common cause of industrial failures.

An incident at the site illustrates the severity of scaling up.

We share an episode where, while attempting a scale-up in a 5,000-liter reaction vessel, a specific material addition method caused reaction efficiency to fall well below initial expectations. The discussion then expands to the role of agitators in ensuring efficient and uniform reactions, as well as the unique site-specific strategy of manufacturing in batches rather than all at once. What exactly happened on the ground? Please listen to the full episode to find out.