Industrial Heat Pump Integration in Non-Continuous Processes Using Thermal Energy Storages as Utility – A Graphical Approach

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate a practical methodology for heat pump (HP) integration in non-continuous processes which is not expensive in terms of computation time and resources. Therefore, a methodology is developed based on graphical Pinch Analysis techniques and further on the developed COP Curves. The methodology is applied to an AMMIX butter production of a large dairy factory. It is shown, that by integrating a HP and using thermal energy storages (TESs) to compensate for the non-continuous behavior, the capital cost for the system is approximately reduced by the factor of 2.2. Further, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions can be reduced with a slight decrease in total annual cost (TAC). However, by considering future natural gas and electricity prices, it is shown that the TAC can be reduced further.