Multi‐objective optimization and dynamic control of heat exchanger network for heat pump distillation of acetic acid/acetic anhydride binary system

Abstract In this paper, the heat pump distillation coupled heat exchange network system (MVRHP‐HEN) for acetic acid/acetic anhydride separation is optimized with the minimum total annual cost (TAC) and CO 2 emissions as objective functions, meanwhile, the optimized process is simulated dynamically. Firstly, we proposed two optimization schemes: (a) the single objective and multi‐objective optimizations of the MVRHP system over the acetic acid separation column are firstly carried out and then constructed the heat exchange network, namely, MVRHP‐HEN‐1; (b) the heat exchange network is first constructed and then the single objective and multi‐objective optimization of MVRHP‐HEN is carried out, that is, MVRHP‐HEN‐2. The results show that MVRHP‐HEN‐2 obtains lower TAC and CO 2 emissions compared with MVRHP‐HEN and MVRHP‐HEN‐1 and has better economic and environmental benefits. Then, the two‐point temperature control structure is built for the dynamic simulation of the optimized separation process. The results show that the proposed control structure has a strong anti‐interference ability. The research is expected to provide guidance for the development and design of advanced heat pump distillation technology.