Linear optimization models for the simultaneous design of mass and heat networks of an eco-industrial park

Overview & Synopsis

The design of industrial processes needs to be adapted as cheap natural resources are scarcer and environmental standards are more stringent to limit their environmental footprints. In order to improve their cost-effectiveness as well as their sustainability, industrial effluents must considered as potential heat and mass resources whether they are recycled locally or at a larger scale by sharing them with other industrial companies; thus forming an eco-industrial park (EIP).This thesis presents a new systemic and systematic approach to design optimal mass allocation and heat exchanger networks simultaneously. Three linear models of incremental complexity have been developed to design optimal recovery networks at a local scale. The first linear model (M1) looks for the necessary minimum fresh resource consumption. The second linear model (M2) presents a new superstructure that allows optimizing mass and heat requirements simultaneously, targeting the minimum annual operating costs. The third linear model (M3) allows designing optimal mass allocation and heat exchanger networks simultaneously. Its objective function is the total annualized cost considering operating and capital costs.The opportunity to use regeneration units is added to the structure of the three previous models. Any type of these units can be represented by a simple model with the generic parameters based on objects already existing in the previous models formulations.Finally, a M3 model applicability is extended to the design of collaborative eco-industrial parks with additional concepts (sites, clusters, indirect heat and mass networks) to obtain a new M4 model. In this model, the capital costs related to the topology of the networks are taken into account in the objective function.The relevance and performances of the proposed models are validated with several case studies taken from the literature.