Case Study 5 - Automobile Industry

Waste Heat Recovery from engine testing facility for Automobile Industry

System Description

Initial situation

• Automotive plant has an Engine Test-bench on which the engines gets tested for performance. Depending upon production capacity, the bench has simultaneous testing facility for 25 to 50 engines at a time approx.
• During testing, the engines exhausts huge amount of flue gas together into a common stack, and rejects heat into jacket water cooling system. The load test involves braking systems, which rejects energy of torque into cooling tower.
• All this heat energy gets wasted into the atmosphere.

Challenges

• The engines testing is a batch type operation. Although simultaneous testing takes place on the bench, variation comes into heat rejection pattern.
• The recovered heat is required to be converted into useful form, as required by the plant.

Solution can be offered

• The heat can be recovered from flue gas in the form of high pressure steam in suitable Waste Heat Recovery Boiler. Suitable system can be provided to absorb the cyclic operation and give out steam at steady state condition.
• The high pressure steam can drive steam turbine generator to produce power.
• The heat can be recovered from jacket water in the form of hot water.
• A generator can be coupled to the engine while testing, which can produce power.

Note: It is a proposed system. Installation is yet to take place.

Existing Process Schematic

Revised Process Schematic

Results

• The quantity of recovered waste heat solely depends upon number & capacities of engines and fuels used.
• The quantity estimations can be done on the factual data available for specific cases.