What does a true standard condensate stabilizer look like?

Do you really have a true standard plant?

Do you have a standard plant? Many of us probably say yes.

Do you really have a standard plant? Only some of us might say yes with hesitation.

Do you really have a true standard plant? Only very few of us will say yes with confidence.

The reason why you don't have a standard plant

The reason why only very few of us have a true standard plant is that making plants standard is really, really, really hard. Many of us fail to answer the ultimate question: what's the output with the customer's particular input if they decide to choose your standard plant? We know the performance and the utility requirement at the design conditions of the standard plant, but how about the off-design conditions with a given set of existing equipment? In this video, you will learn what a true standard condensate stabilizer looks like.

Geothermal Power Plants Modeling 101: Rigorous Rating

Geothermal Power Plants Modeling 101: Rigorous Rating

     This blog is the first article in a series of Geothermal Power Plants Modeling. This 101 shows how a geothermal power plant is rigorously rated, thus the performance of the power plant can be guaranteed with great confidence.

Do You Really Know How Your PRICO LNG Plant Performs at Off-Design Conditions?

You designed your PRICO LNG plant, you know what it is supposed to do at the design condition. Do you really know how it performs at off design conditions?

Two rate based process simulation models are developed by Guofu Chen. One is a fast rating method utilizing UA, while the other method embeds Aspen EDR to rigorously model the performance of the plate-fin heat exchangers.

One Minute Process Engineering: Design, Check or Simulate Shell and Tube Heat Exchangers

Welcome to One Minute Series of shell and tube heat exchangers.

Is it possible to design, check or simulate shell and tube heat exchangers in one minute? Surely it is. 

Aspen Exchanger Design and Rating (EDR) program is widely used to design, check or simulate shell and tube heat exchangers in the oil and gas industry. It is extremely powerful. However, being powerful also means being complicated.

One Minute Process Engineering: Size an Air Cooled Heat Exchanger

Are you tired of designing Air Cooled Heat Exchangers for your application? Air Cooled Heat Exchangers are a highly standard product. Can you please simply give me how many number of bays I need for my application in one hour, instead of spending several days with various designs and plots?

Optimize Design and Operation of Renewable Energy Cycle through Aspen HYSYS Integrated with Aspen EDR Software

ABSTRACT

In this R&D note, how to utilize ASPEN HYSYS optimizer and ASPEN EDR to improve power output and to reduce the cost in the renewable engineering field is described. First, the process model in HYSYS is set up based on the best engineering practice. Second, HYSYS optimizer is utilized to maximize the power output, subject to constraints such as shell and tube exchanger pinch. Third, HYSYS and EDR are used to size the most cost effective exchangers based on cost and performance evaluation. Finally HYSYS integrated with EDR is utilized to rate the whole cycle, mimic the real plant operation and do what-if studies.

Slides: Design Geothermal Power Plants with Confidence

Designing and Achieving Geothermal Power Plant Performance with Confidence

Presented by Guofu Chen in Renewable Energy World Conference in Orlando in 2013

Paper: Designing and Achieving Geothermal Power Plant Performance with Confidence

Designing and Achieving Geothermal Power Plant Performance with Confidence

Guofu Chen, TAS Energy Inc. 6110 Cullen Blvd, Houston, TX 77021

Abstract

The design and the actual performance of a geothermal air-cooled power plant utilizing a supercritical refrigerant of R134a as the working fluid are discussed. A supercritical Organic Rankine Cycle (“ORC”) in many cases outperforms a sub-critical cycle, from the net kilowatt (kW) generated point of view. Additionally, the plant configuration is simpler to design and easier to operate. An additional advantage of using non-flammable working fluid in the cycle, such as R134a, eliminates the risk of fires. During the design stage, a preliminary process flow diagram is established based on the standard process engineering practices in HYSYS, a simulation software from ASPENTECH. Based on the preliminary process requirement, the components of the cycle, including the shell and tube heat exchanger(s), expansion turbine, aircooled condenser, and working fluid feed pump are sized and selected. A true simulation model is built to analyze the off design performance of a “virtual plant”. Given the geothermal heat source information and the ambient conditions, the power output is maximized and committed to the customer (Model 1 with geometries). After the plant is successfully commissioned, by measuring the flow rate, temperature and pressure, a plant reality model is built to reflect the actual plant operating conditions (Model 2 without geometries). Normally the process conditions of Model 2 are different from Model 1. To validate Model 1, developed in the design stage, the process conditions of Model 2 are extracted and input into Model 1, thus Model 3 with actual process conditions and actual geometries is established. Model 2 is the reality, while Model 3 is used to predict the reality with actual process conditions and actual equipment selection. By comparing these two models, Model 3 accurately predicts the gross power and net power generated at various operating conditions.