ChE 3E04 – Process Model Formulation and Solution

Fall 2012 – Homework 1

Due: Friday Sept 28, 8:30am Note: to be performed in groups of up to three.
Grading:100 pts. Weight: 5% of total course grade.

QUESTIONS

(Q1) – Eight (one around each side of the heat exchanger). Hot side balance, cold side balance for
W, X, Y, and Z.

(Q2) They are:

Exchanger: W X Y Z
Cold Side: F10 = F11 F11 = F12 F7 = F8 F8 = F9
Hot Side: F2 = F3 F5 = F6 F1 = F2 F4 = F5

Alternatively, you could do combinations of overall and local balances, for example:

Balance: W Overall Y Overall

Cold Side: F10 = F11 F10 = F12 F7 = F8 F7 = F9
Hot Side: F2 = F3 F5 = F6 F1 = F3 F4 = F6

Etc.

(Q3) 12, one flow rate for each

(Q4) Choosing the first example above here, I could rewrite the equations as:
F1 – F2 = 0 F2 – F3 = 0 etc.
This would give me a matrix of

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And in this class and usually everywhere else, it’s ok to use the following shorthand notation for the
answer above.

(Q5) Add 4 equations (or eliminate 4 variables)

(Q6) The change in energy of the hot stream should equal the change in energy of the cold stream.
You could write this in many ways, either using enthalpies or heat capacities.

One way is to use intrinsic enthalpies as follows:

W: h3*F3 – h2*F2 = h10*F10 – h11*F11

X: h6*F6 – h5*F5 = h11*F11 – h12*F12
Y: h2*F2 – h1*F1 = h7*F7 – h8*F8
Z: h5*F5 – h4*F4 = h8*F8 – h9*F9

Using the same idea, you might want to substitute in your mass balance equations now for
convenience, so you could replace F2 and F3 with F1, for example:

X: h6*F4 – h5*F4 = h11*F10 – h12*F10

W: h3*F1 – h2*F2 = h10*F10 – h11*F10
Y: h2*F1 – h1*F1 = h7*F7 – h8*F7
Z: h5*F4 – h4*F4 = h8*F7 – h9*F7

You could alternatively use the relationship with intrinsic enthalpy and heat capacity and the
assumption that heat capacity is constant at any temperature as follows: hi = Cpi (Ti-Tref)

W: Cp,1*F1 (T3 – T2) = Cp,10*F10(T10 – T11)

X: Cp,4*F4 (T6 – T5) = Cp,10*F10(T11 – T12)
Y: Cp,1*F1 (T2 –T1) = Cp,7*F7(T7 – T8)
Z: Cp,4*F4 (T5 – T4) = Cp,7*F7(T8 – T9)

Note that Tref cancels itself out! This gives the famous Q = F Cp ΔT equation you find so common
(but is only true when heat capacity is constant!!!)

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NOTE: These may not be independent! There are actually only three independent equations in the
event that all Cp and Fi are known, which is the challenge of the next question.

(Q7) Without knowing anything else, this system is NONLINEAR. You cannot write is as Ax = b
since x contains unknown variables F’s and T’s/Cp’s/h’s.

(Q8) For the first bullet, you will have:

2nd Law for a stream:

Exchanger: W X Y Z
Cold Side: T10 ≤ T11 T11 ≤ T12 T 7 ≤ T8 T 8 ≤ T9
Hot Side: T 3 ≤ T2 T 6 ≤ T5 T 2 ≤ T1 T 5 ≤ T4

For the second bullet, you will have:

2nd Law for the exchanger (temperature crossover)

Exchanger: W X Y Z
Cold Inlet: T10 ≤ T3 T11 ≤ T6 T 7 ≤ T2 T 8 ≤ T5
Hot Inlet: T11 ≤ T2 T12 ≤ T5 T 8 ≤ T1 T 9 ≤ T4

NOTE: There are other ways to do this! With the definition of entropy, for example!

Since dH = F Cp dT (for constant heat capacity), we can integrate from the initial (Ts) to the final (Tf)
temperature:

So for each exchanger, you must have ΔS > 0. For example, this is the net change in the hot stream
(should be negative) plus the net change in the cold stream (should be positive). This means that
ΔS for exchanger W:

( ) ( )

You would then need another balance for each exchanger. This ensures that the 2nd law holds and
is equivalent to the “2nd bullet” constraints above. BUT DON’T FORGET THAT YOU NEED
ABSOLUTE UNITS!!!

HOWEVER. There is one implicit assumption that this does not prevent: cases where cold streams
might get really hot in one exchanger, then get colder in the next exchanger. In this case, exchanger
Z actually goes in reverse! This is physically possible but we assumed we didn’t want this, so we
would still need to the “first bullet” constraints to prevent this situation.

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Important note! There was a big mistake in the assignment itself in that I provided an ill-posed
problem. Basically, the flow rates and temperatures that I specified for Q9 are completely
infeasible. If you do a “total” energy balance, you’ll see that the total hot streams lose 292.15
kJ/sec of heat but the cold streams only gain 145.6 kJ/sec of heat. So that is completely
impossible. As a result, if you proceeded assuming that the problem is well posed, as you have
no doubt been institutionalized to do, then there are two possible answers, depending on which
three balances you chose. That should never happen, it should never matter like that.

Fortunately, the problem statement indicated that the “correct” answer for T5 is between 90-
110C and if so that narrows down one of the two possibilities. The below answers are based on
that result (starting with the file Q12.m). The “other” possible result is Q12b.m.. But really both
are meaningless since the problem itself is meaningless.

In studying for the exams, it is more important to have an understanding of the methods, than
the actual answers to these equations.

(Q9) Using the third set of equations from Q7 you can write it this way. Note that the balance for
heat exchanger W causes the system to be over-specified since we can solve for T8 through the
other balances. There are other ways of doing this.

[ ][ ] [ ]

Written this way, we know everything in the left and right matrices, which when substituting in
becomes:

[ ][ ] [ ]

I didn’t write the units to save space but they work out. The elements in the A matrix are in kJ/K-
sec, the elements of x are in K, and the elements in b are kJ/sec. (Energy flow, so it makes sense).

(Q10) 0 (it’s square)

(Q11) linear, can write as Ax=b

(Q12) 102.7°C

(Q13) 45.7°C

(Q14) 43.8°C

(Q15) Yes, all constraints are satisfied.

(Q16) See solution file Q12.m.

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(Q17) 103.4°C -- below this T8 is too large (bigger than T9… the cold stream goes the wrong way)

(Q18) 142.7°C -- above this T11 is too large, is above T6 and violates temperature crossover limit.

(Q19) See solution file Q17.m

(Q20) The new balances are as follows, around each exchanger:

W: F10Cp10T10 + F2Cp2T2 = F11Cp11T11 + F3Cp3T3

X: F11Cp11T11 + F5Cp5T5 = F12Cp12T12 + F6Cp6T6
Y: F1Cp1T1 + F7Cp7T7 = F2Cp2T2 + F8Cp8T8
Z: F8Cp8T8 + F4Cp4T4 = F9Cp9T9 + F5Cp5T5

Also, we know that F1=F2=F3, F4=F5=F6, F7=F8=F9 so we can simplify as follows:

W: F10Cp10T10 + F1Cp2T2 = F10Cp11T11 + F1Cp3T3

X: F10Cp11T11 + F4Cp5T5 = F10Cp12T12 + F4Cp6T6
Y: F1Cp1T1 + F7Cp7T7 = F1Cp2T2 + F7Cp8T8
Z: F7Cp8T8 + F4Cp4T4 = F7Cp9T9 + F4Cp5T5

I have highlighted the unknown variables (there are four)

(Q21) They are different because in the different scenarios, the number of knowns are different.
In scenario 1, for example, you know all the Fs, all Cps, and T2, or 17 total, leaving the 20-17=3
variables and thus require 20-17=3 equations to get a square system.

But we see that the balance around W isn’t needed since we already knew T11! So based on the
realities of what we know about the system, we only needed three heat exchanger balances to solve
for the unknowns, not four.

In scenario 3, we only know the values of 16 parameters and thus have 4 unknowns remaining.
This means we need all 4 exchanger balances to be solved. Fundamentally, this is because the when
mass and energy balances are integrated, usually we need more information to solve since mass
flows and energy flows are linked and dependent on one another. In scenarios 1 and 2, all mass
flows were known, leaving only energy balances, and is thus considerably simpler.

(Q22) With the definitions z8 = F7T8 and z11 = F10T11 (solved separately from the linear system) this
becomes:

W: F10Cp10T10 + F1Cp2T2 = Cp11z11 + F1Cp3T3

X: Cp11z11 + F4Cp5T5 = F10Cp12T12 + F4Cp6T6
Y: F1Cp1T1 + F7Cp7T7 = F1Cp2T2 + Cp8z8
Z: Cp8z8 + F4Cp4T4 = F7Cp9T9 + F4Cp5T5

Which in matrix form is

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 [ ][ ] [ ]

And plugging in all of the knows yields:

[ ][ ] [ ]

(Q23) T11 is 31.4°C and valid.

(Q24) F7 is 11.3 kg/s and valid (not negative). See Q23.m for solution code.

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