Comparison Of Active And Passive Cold Chain Packaging Systems

By Dan Catizone

Much has been written about cold chain logistics, however, successful and efficient planning still presents many challenges. One of them is choosing an appropriate packaging system. (You can learn more about overcoming cold chain logistics challenges in our White Paper "Best Practices in Cold Chain Logistics Planning".)

One of the most important first steps in selecting appropriate packaging is to identify whether a passive or active shipping system is needed. We have come across situations where shippers selected a passive system they use for dry ice shipments and assumed adding cold packs to the insulated design would keep the 2-8c shipment cold. However, shippers take a great risk making this assumption especially if the packaging system has not been tested under these conditions. Companies should always use packaging that has been properly tested or qualified for maintaining the required temperature range.