Project Synopsis
Work with the corporate engineering group of a world-wide chemicals manufacturer to identify and develop GHG emissions reduction alternatives and viable projects across their US production facility assets.
Project Summary
The client, a world-wide producer of pigments and chemicals, has numerous manufacturing sites all over the world. The client’s corporate office contracted Process Engineering Associates, LLC (PROCESS) to evaluate and define potential Green House Gas (GHG) emissions reduction alternatives to support the client’s self-imposed Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) sustainability metrics.
Project tasks included:
- Develop a questionnaire to be used by site operations personnel to gather information on fuel gas and energy usage for process and utility systems.
- Evaluate the questionnaire data from multiple plants to identify areas of significant fuel usage and subsequently evaluate efficiency improvements at those sites. PROCESS project team members visited the four (4) highest energy usage production facilities in North America to better understand fuel and energy efficiency improvement opportunities. This effort led to the identification of two (2) areas of focus; steam efficiency upgrades at one site and new combustion controls and possible burner replacement for belt furnaces at another site. PROCESS worked with the client to evaluate alternatives to meet fuel usage reduction goals in both areas.
- Perform a technical alternatives evaluation for boiler system upgrades to improve efficiency and allow for better handling of actual peak and average steam loads. Alternatives evaluated included (a) multi-pressure packaged boiler systems, (b) a combined heat and power (CHP) system, and (c) an on-demand boiler for seasonal steam requirements. The site has two (2) existing large inefficient boilers so it was critical to evaluate alternatives quickly to direct investment of capital/expenses appropriately.
- Support site operations in the evaluation of upgrades to the burner management system and burners for the belt furnaces. This involved direct interface with burner system vendors.
- Develop a process control description for the pigment reactors and dryer interface to establish a baseline for future upgrades to “smarter controls” for additional optimization of fuel efficiency on the dryers.
Based on this work, PROCESS later supported the client by further developing these projects to the FEL-1 and FEL-2 design level.
Industry Type
Chemicals and Pigments Manufacturing
Utilized Skills
- Process plant energy efficiency improvements
- Plant improvement project identification, scoping, and development.