Waste heat recovery unit | EPFL Graph Search

A waste heat recovery unit (WHRU) is an energy recovery heat exchanger that transfers heat from process outputs at high temperature to another part of the process for some purpose, usually increased efficiency. The WHRU is a tool involved in cogeneration. Waste heat may be extracted from sources such as hot flue gases from a diesel generator, steam from cooling towers, or even waste water from cooling processes such as in steel cooling. Heat recovery units Waste heat found in the exhaust gas of various processes or even from the exhaust stream of a conditioning unit can be used to preheat the incoming gas. This is one of the basic methods for recovery of waste heat. Many steel making plants use this process as an economic method to increase the production of the plant with lower fuel demand. There are many different commercial recovery units for the transferring of energy from hot medium space to lower one:

Recuperators: This name is given to different types of heat ex

Polymer spiral film gas-liquid heat exchanger for waste heat recovery in exhaust gases

Antoine Breton

In this master thesis report the development of an innovative spiral heat exchanger based on polymer materials is described. Building prototypes, erection of a test bench and firsts tests of the heat exchanger are presented. The heat exchanger prototype survived all tests especially several days in contact with aggressive gases. A facility integrating a Diesel exhaust gases production has been developed to test this heat exchanger design. Performance results obtained during the tests are analysed. Measurement acquisition software developed with Labview was also used. Challenges have been overcome to run the facility in stable conditions in order to obtain reliable measurement. Heat load recovery achieved with the presented heat exchanger is in the range of 1.5 kW thermic but potential heat recovery about 3.5kW might be achievable. Overall heat transfer coefficient is improved compared to other polymer based heat exchanger design. Pressure drop on gas channel is in the range of several mbar and must be further improved and fouling must be minimized. Such a design based on polymer film technology provides better corrosion and chemical resistance compared to conventional metal heat exchangers. Due to the smooth surface of polymer film fouling is reduced. Series production and usage of such heat exchangers would allow operating low temperature waste heat recovery in gases at affordable costs. One promising application is heat recovery in soiled gases in combination with ORC power generation.

2012

Enthalpy and exergy analysis in the framework of a district scale energy balance

Cédric Lambiel

This report presents a study of an enthalpy and exergy analysis in the framework of a district scale energy balance. Energy demand (heating, cooling and lighting) for buildings represents more than 30 % of the total worlds energy use. Main eﬀorts have been made on increasing performances of new building envelop and on the use of low temperature processes in order to increase the exergy eﬃciency. On a district scale, diﬀerent temperature and energy ﬂow levels are present, meaning a great potential to make use of synergetic eﬀects by rationally managing energy ﬂow interactions between buildings as synergies by enhanced energy management and the usability of waste heat source. An optimisation of exergy ﬂows for the heating systems allows to identify the temperatures levels according to the energy demand, which helps to implement the best choice of available technologies. A number of connection cases will be described and studied to show the potential gain in terms of thermal and economical performances, where the thermal performances are deﬁned by both the energy and the exergy eﬃciency. This study shows an improvement of the thermal performances of connection cases where in all scenarios the heat losses are lower than the waste heat recovery. These gains on thermal performances may increase further by the integration of appropriate technologies such as heat pumps. The use of primary resource like gas can also be decreased.

2012

Integration of Organic Rankine Cycles for Waste Heat Recovery in Industrial Processes

Matthias Bendig

Developing a methodology that allows identifying maximumelectricity production with the help of Organic Rankine Cycles (ORC) from the waste heat of an industrial process, at the lowest specific cost, without jeopardising the increase of the industrial process’s thermal efficiency. Such is the goal of this thesis. In order to reach this goal, a software tool which is able to identify the most suitable cycle for a heat source regarding electricity production and cost efficiency is developed and explained in detail. Threemain areas of research can be identified, the definition of waste heat, the analysis of experimental data with the help of data reconciliation and the identification of a suitable working fluid and operation parameters of an ORC for any given heat source. A method for identifying, characterising and quantifying the available waste heat, which can be converted into a useful form, for any industrial system, is presented. A distinction is made between avoidable and unavoidable waste heat. Combined pinch analysis and exergy analysis is used to characterise the waste heat potential of a given process. Based on the study of two industrial processes, it will become clear how the constraints of a waste heat analysis influence the outcome and the potential for the integration of ORCs. The studies illustrate how the increase in energy efficiency and degree of heat recovery and integration of a process can be contradictory to the production of electricity with ORCs. The concept of data reconciliation is needed for the measurements, collected from two ORC demonstrators. Apart from "classical" data reconciliation, a new method is presented, which consists in including parameters as virtual measurements and time dependency of measurements. This increases the redundancy of the system and thus the overall accuracy of the reconciled values. A methodology, capable of choosing the designpoint, a suitable working fluid and a cycle configuration, for the lowest specific investment cost while at the same time maximising the electricity output, for a given process environment is developed. The new methodology uses a multi objective optimisation (master optimisation) andMixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) problem (slave optimisation). A novel approach of combining multi objective nonlinear master optimisations with single objective linear slave optimisations is introduced, increasing the reliability of the algorithm.

EPFL2015

Integration of Organic Rankine Cycles for Waste Heat Recovery in Industrial Processes

Matthias Bendig

EPFL2015