Diseño de un intercambiador de calor para el precalentamiento de agua desmineralizada

Abstract

CONDITION FOR PUBLICATION OF PROJECT. The Ecuadorian industry presents significant inefficiencies in waste heat utilization, particularly in evaporation processes that generate secondary steam traditionally released to the environment. This project evaluates the technical and energetic feasibility of implementing a plate heat exchanger to preheat demineralized water through waste heat recovery from vinasse evaporation processes, contributing to energy consumption reduction and aligning with Sustainable Development Goals. A corrugated plate heat exchanger in AISI 316L stainless steel was designed, configured to operate in countercurrent flow with 33 plates. Energy balances, thermal analysis using LMTD method, hydrodynamic characterization, and economic evaluation considering available commercial equipment were performed. The methodology included iterative calculations to validate heat transfer coefficients and geometric dimensioning. Results demonstrated that the system achieves heating of demineralized water from 32°C to 50.10°C, recovering 572,731 W of residual thermal energy. A 28.7% reduction in energy consumption was obtained, equivalent to USD 133,652 savings per operational period, with an investment payback period of 2 months. The designed heat exchanger represents a technically viable and economically profitable solution to optimize industrial energy efficiency, contributing significantly to the environmental sustainability of the process. Keywords: thermal recovery, energy efficiency, vinasse, industrial sustainability