Review of metaheuristics applied to heat exchanger network design

Abstract

Heat exchanger networks (HENs) are a useful method of reducing the energy costs and environmental impact of industrial processes. Therefore, many papers focusing on solving HEN design problems efficiently have been published in the last years and several techniques have been proposed for their solution. The high complexity of the problem has led to an increment in the number of papers that use metaheuristics to solve it. The main reason is the capability of metaheuristics to handle complex problems in a feasible computational time. Additionally, this approach can easily take into account investment costs, and it offers more flexibility in the definition of the objective function and problem restrictions. In this paper, we review the most relevant papers that use metaheuristic techniques to resolve the HEN design problem. We also propose a method for grouping the different analyzed metaheuristics. It is based on a series of characteristics that allows the correct characterization of the different approaches.

Quantum computing for energy systems optimization: Challenges and opportunities

“…HENS is a NP-hard problem for which an exact polynomial-time computational algorithm does not exist [65]. Several metaheuristic techniques capable of handling complex problems in a feasible computational time have also been proposed [66,67].…”

Hybrid Ant Colony Optimization Algorithm for Workforce Planning

“…Nowadays, nature-inspired metaheuristic methods receive great attention [2], [15], [19], [21], [22]. In considered here problem some heuristic method including genetic algorithm [1], [13], memetic algorithm [20], scatter search [1] etc., are applied.…”

Neuro-genetic approach for optimization of the water flowrates distribution on a hydrogen sulphide cooling system

“…Another group of authors has applied optimization and heat transfer enhancement techniques to increase the equipment thermal performance (Reyes-Rodríguez & Moya-Rodríguez, 2016;Toimil & Gómez, 2017;Alam & Kim, 2018;Abdul-Wahhab et al, 2021). In this ambit, when heat exchangers network (HEN) retrofit methods are implemented, two main scenarios exist: fixed network structure, and topology modification.…”