HEAT INTEGRATION

1. Introduction – The problem

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 1

 Outline

Hot and cold streams

Heating and cooling utilities
Thermodynamic point of view
Heat Integration
Goals
The problem

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 2

 Hot and cold streams
Most industrial processes need thermal energy to run:
Some streams need to be heated
Reactor feeds
Distillation bottoms (vapor generation)

We’ll call them Cold Streams

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 3

 Hot and cold streams

Some streams need to be cooled

Feeds to separation units
Distillation heads (liquid return generation)
Products for storage
We’ll call them Hot Streams

Power may also be needed;

we’ll not treat that (directly)

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 4

 Heating and cooling utilities
To keep the process running an Energy Price must be paid:
A heating system must be run
Steam from a boiler
Direct heat from a furnace
Flue gases from a turbine
And a cooling system too
Cooling water
Low temperature refrigeration
These are the Heating and Cooling Utilities

Energy Cost comes from fuel, power, equipment, workforce...

... and may be a great part of the running cost
Reducing this cost is the aim of Heat Integration

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 5

 Delayed Coker Unit: PFD

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 6

 Delayed Coker Unit: HXs

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 7

 Thermodynamic Point of View (1)
Every process can be represented as a Heat Engine:

High grade energy must be added

Low grade energy must be removed
Some transformations take place (reactions, separations... )
Utilities serve to:
Drive Generated Entropy out of the system
Maintain internal gradients alive (driving forces of transformation)

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 8

 Thermodynamic Point of View (2)
2nd Principle: to maintain a gradient alive one must
Add heat at the hot end (high T) --- continuously
Withdraw heat at the cold end (low T) --- continuously
or the gradient vanish/dies of tendency to equilibrium
Dead state
Maximum entropy

But... heat flows down spontaneously with temperature:

Heat withdrawn (to cool a stream)...
... can be added at a lower T (to heat another stream)
and therefore used several times along the whole range between
the highest heating temperature
and the lowest cooling temperature

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 9

 Heat Integration

Some heating and cooling may be saved by

Heat
HeatIntegration
Integration

Technique
Techniqueofofputting
puttingprocess
processhot
hotstreams
streams
ininthermal
thermalcontact
contactwith
withprocess
processcold
coldstreams
streams
across
acrossheat
heatexchangers
exchangers
ininorder
orderto,
to,primarily,
primarily,save
saveenergy
energycosts
costs

A modern, well designed plant should be heat integrated

(even when no contacts are actually implemented)

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 10

 Delayed Coker Unit: HEN

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 11

 Goals
The set of thermal contacts between streams is called a
Heat Exchanger Network (HEN)

Streams: includes process and utilities

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 12

 Goals

There will be an optimal HEN to be found

when designing a process from grass-root
when retrofitting it

Including the right amount and type of heating and cooling utilities

Optimal: multiple criteria

Minimum (energy cost) heating and cooling
Minimum emissions (from utilities)
Minimum number of contacts (heat exchangers)
Good control and operation: start-up, steady state, shut-down

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 13

 The Problem
There will be an optimal set of thermal contacts

If the process includes a few streams, the best set of contacts

can be readily found by eye:
Pairing possibilities are scarce
Selecting the heat integration topology is easy

But as the number of streams increases:

Pairing possibilities grows exponentially
Selecting the right heat integration topology is difficult

Methods and Techniques are needed

Heat Integration – UVa 01.The problem 14