Energy systems management and greenhouse gas reduction

The efficient use of energy provides the double benefits of controlling energy costs and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The industrial sector comprises about one third of US GHG emissions, thus, is an attractive opportunity for using advanced design, operation and control strategies to minimize energy consumption while optimizing overall systems performance through the implementation of cogeneration, heat recovery, adaptive controls and other advanced techniques. A discussion on energy systems management and GHG reduction covers barriers to the utilization of such techniques; rate of onsite CO₂ production from combustion of fuel, e.g., natural gas, to produce heat; approaches for taking advantage of the carbon characteristics of the energy sources to minimize the GHG emissions associated with a particular energy requirement; algorithms for comparing alternatives under dynamic conditions; a tool for evaluating the GHG impact of different methods for providing facility electrical power and process heat; and finding that cogeneration can result in a significant reduction in GHG emissions. This is an abstract of a paper presented at the 42nd Loss Prevention Symposium (New Orleans, LA 4/6-10/2008).