Industrial steam systems: Strategic framework with proxy measurements to evaluate the total cost of steam

Abstract With the ongoing effort towards increased sustainability, manufacturers are required to reduce their consumption of resources and their environmental impact. In order to optimise systems, detailed metering audits are necessary to identify possible efficiency improvements. However, developed metering guidelines from academia are in many cases not applicable in manufacturing systems. Missing measuring devices impede the acquisition of relevant parameters. To overcome this barrier, easy to adopt metering methodologies are required for industrial utilities that are able to handle data gaps. Thus, this research provides a comprehensive framework for steam metering, including an approach to approximate missing data through proxy metering strategies. Industrial steam systems are complex and abstracting the investigated system leads to accelerated data collection. Relevant data gaps are addressed by a proxy metering device, a mathematical model that is set up on previously gained process knowledge and available online meters to infer the missing parameter. The benefit of applying this comprehensive metering methodology is demonstrated in the form of a total cost of steam analysis which is based on the recorded resources and further added values for the steam generation. The presented framework was successfully applied in a case study that showed relevant steam flows could be analysed in terms of their flowrate and fluctuation while data gaps were sufficiently estimated by a simple to adopt first order model. The analysed total cost of steam unveiled that natural gas was by far the main cost driver, followed by electricity and added mains water. Overall, the presented research has the potential to unfold energy saving opportunities in industrial steam systems and provides a valuable efficiency benchmark with the total cost of steam.