Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Capital Costs
Quickly Calculated
Estimating capital costs early can prevent
unnecessary expenditures on dead-end projects
Gael D. Ulrich and Palligarnai T. Vasudevan
University of New Hampshire
46
Relationships between cost and capacity are part of everyday experience. If,
for example, one were transporting
people in taxicabs and one cab held
four persons (excluding driver), the
capital cost to convey eight people is
twice that of carrying four. For 20 to
30 people, a bus or van could be used
where equipment cost is no longer directly proportional to number of people. This can be expressed mathematically as follows:
(1)
AS A FUNCTION OF CAPACITY*
Size
range
Agitators
Capacity Exponent
unit
a
1200
kW
0.7
Blowers, centrifugal
508,000
kW
0.9
Centrifugal pumps
0.01270
kW
0.3
Compressors, reciprocating
102,000
kW
1.0
1050
0.8
101,000
kg/s
0.8
2100
m2
0.6
Dust collectors
Bag filter
Multicyclone
21,100
0.140
m3/s
m3/s
0.9
0.6
Electrostatic precipitators
51,200
m3/s
0.8
Evaporators, falling-film
30320
m2
1.0
1170
m2
0.75
10900
m2
0.6
1800
m3
0.6
Electric motors
108,000
kW
0.9
Refrigeration units
510,000
kJ/s
0.6
Vibratory screens
1130
kW
0.6
20070,000
505,000
m3
m3
0.6
0.7
Belt conveyors
Crushers
Drum dryers
Tanks
Floating roof
Spherical, 05 barg
*Exponents were determined from slopes of the curves in our collection of data
found in Figures 361 of Chapter 5, Ref. [1]. Results are included here primarily for illustration. It is much better to use the curves themselves in a cost
estimate.
Exponential
size-capacity relations
(2)
(4)
(5)
(3)
At Cs dollars per square meter of tank
Chemical Engineering www.che.com April 2009
47
1970
5,000
Feature Report
1980
3,000
(7)
(8)
Radius ratio can be replaced with capacity ratio via Equation (3):
2010
2020
10%
2,000
Nelson-Farrar Index
2%
0%
Cost index, I
(6)
20%
5%
2000
Slopes correspond to
inflation rates as indicated
4,000
1990
1,000
900
800
700
600
Chemical Engineering
Plant Cost Index
500
400
(CE Index = 400 is the
basis for cost data
in Figure 2)
300
(9)
200
(10)
100
1970
1980
1990
2000
Year
2010
2020
Cost
Fraction of f.o.b. **
equipment
Direct materials
$10,000
1.0CP
7,100
0.71CP
6,300
0.63CP
$23,400
2.34CP
1,400
0.14CP
Construction overhead
4,400
0.44CP
2,600
0.26CP
$ 8,400
0.84CP
$31,800
3.18CP
Contingency
4,800
0.48CP
Fee
1,000
0.10CP
$ 5,800
0.58CP
$37,600
3.76CP
Direct labor
Total direct materials and labor
Indirect Project Expenses
*Purchase
price, $10,000;
10
Multiple double-pipe
5
10
Floating head
Teflon tube
Scraped-wall
10
Kettle reboiler
Bayonet
10
10
Double-pipe
Hairpin
multitube
CBM = CP x FBM
cs/cs
cs/Cu
Cu/Cu
cs/ss
ss/ss
cs/Ni
Ni/Ni
cs/Ti
1.00
1.25
1.60
1.70
3.00
2.80
3.80
7.20
Ti/Ti
12.0
Teflon Tube
Shell F M
cs
Cu
ss
Ni
Ti
1.0
1.2
1.3
1.4
3.3
Max. pressure,
7 bara
F p = 1.0
10
0.1
10
100
1,000
10,000
FIGURE 2. Purchased equipment costs for shell-and-tube and double-pipe heat exa
changers. Bare module factors FBM are obtained from Figure 4 using material factors
given here and pressure factor Fp from Figure 3 (cs = carbon steel, ss = stainless steel)
Installation costs
Circle 44 on p. 70 or go to adlinks.che.com/23013-44
Feature Report
1.5
Pressure factor, Fp
rum and
Mller D Systems
er
Contain
009
MA 2 ain
E
ACH
rt / M
ankfu 5.2009
in Fr
- 15.
11.5.
5-B6
from
nd B
S
, ta
.1
3
Hall
1.1
ums
cans
Lidded Dr
/ hopper
th bungs
Drums wi
Hoppers
Silos
rs
Containe
Valves
Butterfly
ucks
Drum Tr
www.mueller-gmbh.com
Circle 43 on p. 70 or go to adlinks.che.com/23013-43
50
30
25
20
15
10
0
0
10
15
20
FIGURE 4. Bare module factors are a function of material and pressure factors for
heat exchangers
Auxiliary facilities
Feature Report
Authors
your path is likely to become more direct and efficient. Even people in technical service or sales will do their jobs
better when they understand the key
factors that control expenses in their
business. In doing this exercise you
may discover you have been spending
time on a worthless project and move
on to generating some of that gold you
are worth.
References
4HE 0ELLBOW
AVA Americas, LLC
Phone: +1(704)248-2767
info@ava-americas.com
www.ava-americas.com
Horizontal mixers
Batch mixers
Horizontal dryers
Batch dryers
Continuous mixers
4HE /UTSTANDING %LBOW
4HE 0ELLBOW 2ESISTS 7EAR
.ATURALLY
Vertical dryers
Conical dryers
Continuous dryers
Horizontal dryers
IMPACT ZON
Conical mixers
Vertical mixers