Energy Saving in Industrial Annealing Furnaces

In this study, an energy efficiency studies have been carried out in a natural gas-fired rolling mill annealing furnace of an industrial establishment. In this context, exhaust gas from the furnace has been examined in terms of waste heat potential. In the examinations that have been made in detail; waste heat potential was found as 3.630,31 kW. Technical and feasibility studies have been carried out to realize electricity production through an Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) system for evaluating the waste heat potential of the annealing furnace. It has been calculated that 1.626.378,88 kWh/year of electricity can be generated by using the exhaust gas waste heat of the annealing furnace through an ORC system to produce electric energy with a net efficiency of 16%. The financial value of this energy was determined as 436.032,18 TL/year and the simple repayment period of the investment was 8,12 years. Since the annealing period of the annealing furnace is 2800 hours/year, the investment has not been found to be feasible in terms of the feasibility studies. However, the investment suitability can be assured when the annealing furnace is operating at full capacity for 8,000 hours or more annually