Analysis of the use of waste heat from a glass melting furnace for electricity production in the organic Rankine cycle system

In most production plants, waste heat is usually discharged into the environment, contributing to a reduction in the energy efficiency of industrial processes. This is often due to the low thermal parameters of the carriers in which this energy is contained, such as oils, water, exhaust gases or other post-process gases, which means that their use for electricity production in a conventional Rankine cycle may prove to be economically unprofitable. One of the technologies enabling the use of lowand medium-temperature waste heat carriers is the organic Rankine cycle (ORC) technology. The paper present results of calculations performed to evaluate potential electricity production in ORC using waste heat from a natural gas-fired glass melting furnace. The analysis was carried out assuming the use of a single-stage axial turbine, whose efficiency was estimated using correlations available in the literature. The calculations were carried out for three working fluids, namely hexamethyldisiloxane, dimethyl carbonate, and toluene for two scenarios, i.e. ORC system dedicated only to electricity production and ORC system working in cogeneration mode, where heat is obtain from cooling the condenser. In each of the considered cases, the ORC system achieves the net power output exceeding 300 kW (309 kW for megawatts in the cogenerative mode to 367 kW for toluene in the non-cogenerative mode), with an estimated turbine efficiency above 80%, in range of 80,75 to 83,78%. The efficiency of the ORC system, depending on the used working fluid and the adopted scenario, is in the range from 14.85 to 16.68%, achieving higher efficiency for the non-cogenerative work scenario.