Multi-Objective Design Optimization of Rotating Regenerative Air Preheater Using Genetic Algorithm

In previous references, no study has been done on the optimization of rotary regenerative air preheaters (RAPHs) used in coal-fired power plants yet. The key structure parameters of RAPH include rotor radius, fluid section angles and matrix layer heights. In this study, work on the multi-objective design optimization of an RAPH was conducted by combing the thermal hydraulic calculation program which is developed to calculate the temperature and the pressure drop and the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA-II). The maximum heat transfer rate and the minimum friction, namely minimum outlet gas temperature and pressure drop, are considered as the conflicting objectives in the multi-optimization. The layer heights, rotor radius, angles of fluid sections and heights of matrix layers are involved in the design variables in the optimization. The optimization includes three cases in which the rotor radius upper limits are 7 m, 8 m and 9 m respectively. Sets of the Pareto-optimal front points were obtained for the different cases. The obtained optimal air-preheaters with larger upper limit of rotor radius would have better Pareto results. The optimum rotor radius is the upper limit value for different design range of rotor radius. The air-preheaters with larger upper design limit of rotor radius would have better Pareto results. In other words, if the upper design limit of rotor radius is too small, all the Pareto points in this case could not satisfy the performance requirements of heat transfer and friction, and the only way is to increase the upper design limit of rotor radius. The ratio of each optimum fluid section angle is determined by the fluid flow rate of each section.