OPTIMUM DESIGN OF MULTIPURPOSE CHEMICAL-PLANTS

The optimum design of chemical plants that are used in different ways at different times is considered. The subset of plants with piecewise constant operating conditions is formulated as a nonlinear program. The design of a multicrude pipeline and the design of sequential multiproduct batch plants are given as examples. The latter implies the solution of a mixed-integer problem for which an efficient method for obtaining good suboptimal solutions is proposed. The results show that with the approach developed in the paper, it is possible to design chemical plants that have a specified flexibility and that are economically optimum. © 1979, American Chemical Society. All rights reserved.