Synthesis of a Cost-Optimal Heat Exchanger Network using Genetic Algorithm and Differential Evolution

Abstract

The heat exchanger network (HEN) synthesis problem can be characterized as non-convex, non-linear and highly combinatory. Mainly for large-scale HEN, the complexity increases even more and mathematical formulation may require very sophisticated methods. In this work, the simultaneous synthesis problem is solved by a bi-level hybrid method: in the upper level a Genetic Algorithm (GA) is used to optimized discrete variables and in the lower level, the continuous variables are optimized by Differential Evolution (DE). Two examples from the literature were used to test the applicability of the proposed solution and results found in terms of the total annual cost (TAC) were lower than those published in the literature.