18 Apr 2017

Increasing cooling system efficiency in a petrochemical plant

Achieving substantial cooling capacity improvements and energy savings

A major refining and petrochemical production plant needed ways to improve their cooling system capacity and energy efficiency. 

DHI examined the possibilities of efficiency improvement by implementing our Industrial Cooling Water Solution. An integral part of the solution is a hydraulic cooling water distribution model developed in MIKE URBAN – DHI’s platform for water distribution and collection system modelling.

The study we carried out as part of the solution revealed substantial energy-saving potential, especially in cold and moderate climates. Applying just one of the identified options in the studied system would potentially provide 11% of energy savings annually.
  

Our solution will arm you with the answers to these difficult questions when managing an industrial plant:

  • When and where is the risk of scaling significant?
  • When should I increase the water flow to improve process safety?
  • Which installations have the greatest ‘cooling comfort’?
  • What will be the impact of reduction of cooling water flow on various process nodes?
  • How to distribute the cooling water to particular process nodes in order to provide the highest productivity of the whole plant?
  • How to adjust the cooling system to diurnal and seasonal changes of air parameters?