Techno-economic analysis of energy storage for best utilization of surplus of thermal and electrical energy

In this work, a model of an Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) able to produce electricity thanks Waste Heat Recovery (WHR) from an industrial process has been developed. To compute all the steps a coupled use of MatLab and Engineer Equations Solver (EES) is used. Very common target in the whole society is energy saving. It is performed with several forms; the present work aims to investigate in the world of the industrial processes and how can be possible the best utilization of a surplus of energy existing during them. The concept of “Waste Heat Recovery” (WHR) is important, waste heat is present in large quantities in several sectors, such as the manufacturing industry, commercial and residential buildings, power plants and transportation systems. Waste Heat Recovery (WHR) systems basically transfer waste energy to a heat carrier or storage system. It’s impossible to perform work without waste heat: wherever goods are produced, and machines are operated, waste heat is produced and released either via radiation, cooling fluid, exhaust gas or air. These streams often contain large amounts of exergy and would be able to perform work through one of the many waste heat usage technologies. The dominant one in these technologies is the TES (Thermal Energy Storage). The using of TES allows also to manipulate the differences between demand and supply and obtain the best utilization of this surplus of energy. The most suitable waste heat sources for power generation are found in energy-intensive industrial processes. All these sources very often experience fluctuations of the available thermal power. To obtain work from the WHR, there is a complication of the plant in terms of components which means adding costs. Furthermore, must be necessary to evaluate how the system is able to use the WHR with a fluctuating source which means operate mainly in off-design. The focus of this study is the coupling of the use of those sources with the ORC using also a TES in order to understand when its techno-economic impact is relevant. That represents an enormous opportunity to increase the energy efficiency of various industry sectors and to reduce emissions and waste of primary sources.