(110b) Energy Consumption Analysis for An Ethylene Plant Start-up

Chemical process energy systems consist of the equipment necessary for process heating, process cooling and refrigeration, electro-chemical processes, mechanical operations, and other direct process uses. At the same time, energy losses occur during the normal process operations and also the turn around operations. Many studies have been conducted on the energy distribution and energy efficiency improvement for normal chemical process production. However, quantitative studies of the energy consumption analysis on chemical plant start-ups are still lacking.

Through the plant-wide dynamic simulation, this paper studies the quantitative energy performance for an ethylene plant start-up. Details about the energy profile of cooling and heating duty of distillation towers, auxiliary heat exchanger duty for start-up, power consumption in charge gas compressor system are provided with respect to the start-up operation procedures. This study enhances the energy research for the manufacturing energy studies and it will also help analysts and decision-makers to better understand the energy consumption in chemical plant turn around operations.