College of Engineering

Department of Chemical Engineering

Process Integration and Optimization

Part I:Process Integration

Lecture 3
Amsalu G.
 Pinch Point Principle
 Once the pinch has been identified, the overall heat recovery system
can be divided into two separate systems: one above and one below
the pinch.
 The system above the pinch requires a heat input and is therefore a net
heat sink.
 Below the pinch, the system rejects heat and so is a net heat source.
 …Cont’d

 When a heat recovery system design does not have cross-pinch

heat transfer, that is, from above to below the pinch, the design
achieves the minimum hot and cold utility requirement under a
given ∆Tmin.

 On the other hand, if cross-pinch heat transfer (XP) is allowed,

what could happen?
 …Cont’d
Negative Impacts: if cross-pinch heat transfer (XP) is allowed
 Increased Utility Requirements:
 More Heating: By transferring heat from the hot side (above the pinch) to
the cold side (below the pinch), you're essentially moving heat away from
where it's already being used to heat the process. This means you'll need
additional external heating to compensate for the heat that's been shifted.
 More Cooling: Similarly, you'll also need more external cooling to
remove the additional heat that's been transferred to the cold side.
 Reduced Energy Efficiency:
 The increased utility requirements will lead to a decrease in overall
energy efficiency.
 …Cont’d
Positive Impacts (In Limited Cases): if cross-pinch heat
transfer (XP) is allowed
 In certain specific scenarios, cross-pinch heat transfer might be
beneficial. For example:
 Improving Temperature Profiles: If there are specific temperature
requirements for certain streams, cross-pinch heat transfer could be
used to adjust temperature profiles to meet those requirements.
 Reducing Pressure Drop: In some cases, cross-pinch heat transfer
might allow for the use of fewer heat exchangers, which could
reduce the overall pressure drop in the system.
 …Cont’d

 Cross-pinch (XP) amount of heat is transferred from system above to the

system below the pinch, as in Figure a, this will create a deficit of heat XP
above the pinch and an additional surplus of heat XP below the pinch.

 The only way this can be corrected is by importing an extra XP amount of

heat from hot utility and exporting an extra XP amount of heat to cold utility
 …Cont’d

 Figure (b) illustrates what happens if inappropriate use of utilities

is made
 …Cont’d

 Figure (C) illustrates what happens if an amount of heat XP

from hot utility is used below the pinch.
 …Cont’d
 Based on the cross-pinch heat transfer principle, if external cooling
is used for hot streams above the pinch, it increases the hot utility
demand by the same amount.
 Similarly, external heating below the pinch increases the overall hot
and cold utility requirement by the same amount.
 To summarize, there are three basic pinch point principle rules
(Linnhoff et al., 1982) that must be obeyed to achieve the minimum
energy targets for a process
1. Do not transfer heat across the Pinch.
2. Do not use cold utility above the Pinch.
3. Do not use hot utility below the Pinch.
 Violating any of these rules will lead to penalty in both hot and cold
utilities beyond the target.
 Data extraction
 It is the one key step of pinch analysis in the design of heat recovery
systems for both new and existing processes.

 Data Extraction, which involves collecting data for the process and the
utility system.

 The amount of information available from plant measurement, data

acquisition systems, DCS (Distributed Control System) and simulation
models of a process can be very large, and most of this data may not be
of relevance to the pinch analysis.

 It is thus necessary to identify and extract only the information that truly
captures the relevant sources (Hot streams) and sinks (Cold streams)
and their interactions with the overall process.
 …Cont’d
 The starting point for a PT analysis is to recognize in the process
of interest, all the process streams that need to be heated and all
those that need to be cooled.

 This necessitates identifying the streams, their flow rates and

thermal properties, phase changes, and the temperature ranges
through which these must be heated or cooled.

 This is performed by Mass and Energy balances establishing

temperatures and pressures for the process streams. ↢ PFD

 Data extraction can be the most time consuming task.

 …Cont’d

 In summary, the data required for each process stream include:

 Mass flowrate (kg/s)

 Specific heat capacity (kJ/kg ℃)

 Supply and target temperatures (℃), and

 Latent Heat of vaporization for streams with a phase

change (kJ/kg)
 …Cont’d
 Additionally, the following information must be collected on
utilities and existing heat exchangers.

 Existing heat exchanger area (m2)

 Heat transfer coefficient for cold and hot sides of heat

exchangers (kW/m2℃)

 Utilities available in the process like water temperature, steam

pressure levels, etc

 Marginal utility costs, as opposed to average utility costs

 Data extraction must be preformed carefully as the results of PA

strongly depend on this step.
 …Cont’d

Stream Ts (℃) Tt (℃) Cp ∆H

Name (KW/℃) (KW)
Hot1 150 30 1.5 -180
Hot2 170 60 3.0 -330
Cold1 80 140 4.0 240
Cold2 20 135 2.0 230
 Placement of Utilities

Threshold problems

 There are some special category of problems, known as

threshold problems, do not have a pinch to divide the
problem into two parts.

 Threshold problems only need a single thermal utility (either

hot or cold but not both) over a range of minimum
temperature difference ranging from zero to threshold
temperature.
 …Cont’d

Different types of threshold problems

 …Cont’d

 The problem which is at ∆Tmin = Tthreshold requires only one

utility i.e. hot utility of QH amount
 When ∆Tmin ≤ Tthreshold as in the case at positions A, the hot
utility demand is still QH = Q1 + Q2
 …Cont’d

 Hence it can be concluded that for ∆Tmin ≤Tthreshold the energy demand

is not a function of relative positions of Hot and cold composite

curves.

 This is a weakness of Pinch Analysis

…Cont’d
 …Cont’d

 It shows a threshold problem for which hot utility is zero, it only

demands cold utility up to Tthreshold.

 Shows the effect of energy demand in terms of cold and hot

utilities if the cold composite curve is shifted horizontally to
positions A and C

 At position “B” which is at ∆Tmin = Tthreshold the hot utility demand

is zero whereas the cold utility demand is QC.
 …Cont’d

 When the cold composite is shifted to position “A” where

∆Tmin < Tthreshold it demands QC1 cold utility at a higher level
and QC2 cold utility at a lower level. Where, the sum of QC1 and
QC2 being equal to QC.

 For the position “C” where ∆Tmin > Tthreshold the process demands
both cold and hot utilities.

 Thus in this case also for ∆Tmin≤ ∆Tthreshold the cold utility
demand is constant and hot utility demand is zero
 Capital‐energy Trade‐off for Threshold Problems
 It shows that fixed cost‐energy cost trade off as a function of ∆Tmin.
 It can be clearly observed that the optimum value either appears when ∆Tmin is
at Tthreshold or more than Tthreshold.
 It never happens when ∆Tmin < Tthreshold. This is because when ∆Tmin≤ Tthreshold
the operating costs are constant since utility demand is constant.
 Fig.(a) shows a situation where the optimum occurs at the threshold and there
is no pinch.
 …Cont’d
 Where as Fig.(b) shows that it is at location where ∆Tmin > Tthreshold.

 In this case there is a demand for both utilities and thus the problem
where there is a pinch.
 Example 1
 A four stream threshold problem is given in the Table below.
Required:
 The Hot and cold composite curves
 The hot and cold utility demands for this problem at ∆Tmin = 10℃
 The hot and cold utility demands for this problem at
∆Tmin = Tthreshold

Stream Name TS (℃) TT (℃) CP ∆H

(KW/℃) (KW)
Hot 1 190 55 3.5 -472.5
Hot 2 155 40 1.8 -207
Cold 1 20 140 2 240
Cold 2 70 150 2.5 200
 …Cont’d

Hot and cold composite curves for the threshold problem

given in above Table
 …Cont’d

Hot and cold utility demand and threshold temperature

 Example 2
 A four stream threshold problem is given in the Table below.
Required:
 The Hot and cold composite curves
 The hot and cold utility demands for this problem at Tmin =10℃
 The hot and cold utility demands for this problem at
Tmin = Tthreshold

Stream TS(℃) TT(℃) Cp ∆H

Name (KW/℃) (KW)
Hot 1 350 290 3.5 -210
Hot 2 400 290 1.8 -198
Cold 3 150 350 2 400
Cold 4 290 400 2.5 275
 …Cont’d

Hot and cold composite curves for the threshold problem

given in above Table
 …Cont’d

Hot and cold utility demand and threshold temperature

 Multiple Utilities
 The energy requirement for a process is supplied via several
utility levels e.g. steam levels, refrigeration levels, hot oil circuit,
furnace, flue gas etc.

Types of utility
 Hot utilities, supplying heat to a process, may include:
1. furnaces,
2. steam heaters, flue gas
3. heat rejected from heat engines,
4. thermal fluid or hot oil systems,
5. exhaust heat from refrigeration systems and heat pump
condensers,
6. electrical heating.
 …Cont’d

 Likewise cold utility systems remove heat from the process.

They may include:
1. cooling water systems,
2. air coolers,
3. steam raising and boiler feed water heating,
4. chilled water systems,
5. refrigeration systems and heat pump evaporators,
6. heat engines below the pinch.
 …Cont’d
 The composite curves in Figure (a) provide extreme utility
levels HP steam and cooling water. Figure (b) shows the
construction of the composite curves if LP steam consumption
replaces part of the HP steam consumption.
 The LP steam load is added to the hot composite curve as
shown in Figure (b).
 As the LP steam consumption increases a ∆Tmin temperature
difference is reached between the composite curves. This is
the maximum LP consumption that can replace the HP steam
consumption.
 Every time a new utility level is added, the same procedure
would have to be repeated in order to set the load on the new
utility level.
 …Cont’d

Composite Curves for Multiple Utilities Targeting

 …Cont’d
 The shape of the composite curves will change with every new
utility level addition and the overall construction becomes quite
complex for several utility levels.
 The composite curves are therefore a difficult tool for setting
loads for the multiple utility levels.
 When there are multiple utility options available, selected to
reduce overall utility costs.
 This involves setting appropriate loads for the various utility
levels by maximizing cheaper utility loads prior to use of more
expensive utilities.
 For example, it is preferable to use LP steam instead of HP
steam, and cooling water instead of refrigeration.
The End of Lecture 3!!!