2017 Volume 50 Issue 7 Pages 568-576
Plant layout is one of the most important factors for reducing plant construction costs. In the research field of plant layouts, the main purpose is to minimize the total length and cost of pipelines between equipment by satisfying various constraints, such as safety regulations and passages for operators. However, previous research overlooks the consideration of operating conditions. Additionally, sufficient safety distances between equipment have to be guaranteed to mitigate danger or domino accidents, and maintenance spaces should be considered for on-site repairs or maintenance. Moreover, various multi-floor plants have been constructed. Therefore, an appropriate algorithm for handling these issues urgently needs to be developed. Equations for the mixed integer non-linear programming problem considering various issues are proposed in this study. In these equations, the objective function is the total summation of pipeline and additional energy costs generated by pressure drop and heat transfer. Additionally, predefined safety and maintenance spaces are transformed into inequality constraints. Because it is not always possible to use the derivatives of equations, such as in this study, an original particle swarm optimization technique is employed. Two case studies are illustrated to verify the efficacy of the proposed algorithm.
