THERMOECONMIC ANALYSIS IN COGENERATION SYSTEMS INTEGRATED IN FOOD PROCESSING INDUSTRY
Márcio Higa1; Andressa Carla Cintra1; Reginaldo Araujo da Silva1; Bruna Menchon Endlich1; Karla Silva2
1 UEM; 2 UTFPR
doi:10.20906/CPS/COB-2015-1859
Resumo
Food processing industry usually requires large amounts of thermal energy and is an energy-intensive industry. The most commonly thermal demand involves different operations such as heating, drying, evaporation, refrigeration and freezing. Considering the energy crisis in Brazil and the large thermal demand, it is essential to study alternatives for reaching efficient energy utilization in order to reduce processing costs. An alternative that has been shown promising to improve the thermal efficiency of the food industrial plants refers to implement cogeneration systems. The objective of this work was to evaluate the technical and economic viability of cogeneration systems in three case studies. Sugar, coffee and soy industrial plants were selected and evaluated using energetic, exergetic and thermoeconomic analysis. Based on this evaluation, it is possible to verify that the cogeneration cycle is technically viable in all the 3 cases, but the advantage of this integration depends on the retrofit level, scale industry, heat demand of the process and fuel and electric power prices, resulting in different investment return.
Palavras-chave: Cogeneration; Thermoeconomy; Exergy; food industry