CCSI Researchers Publish Paper on Simultaneous Process Optimization and Heat Integration Based on Rigorous Process Simulations

CCSI researchers from NETL and CMU published a paper in Computers and Chemical Engineering that describes a new simultaneous process optimization and heat integration approach, which can be used directly with the rigorous models in process simulators. In this approach, the overall process is optimized utilizing external derivative-free optimizers, which interact directly with the process simulation, and the heat integration subproblem is formulated as an LP model which is solved simultaneously during optimization of the flowsheet to update the minimum utility and heat exchanger area targets. This capability is integrated into the CCSI Framework for Optimization, Quantification of Uncertainty and Surrogates (FOQUS). The paper demonstrates that advantages of the approach for three examples: a recycle process, a separation process, and a power plant with carbon capture. The results indicate that this simultaneous approach achieves higher profit and lower operating cost and, in the case of the power plant example, higher net efficiency than a sequential approach.