Electrification of industrial processes with low-to-medium temperature heat demand: Case study of pectin production

The article presents an approach for complete electrification of processes in the low-to-medium temperature manufacturing industry, for which the Danish pectin production factory CP Kelco was used as a case study.The electrification analysis of CP Kelco was carried out by first proposing eight varieties of complete electrification strategies to undergo a screening process. Among the strategies, 3 performed better and were selected for detailed analysis in terms of final energy use and economical and environmental indicators. Compared to Business as Usual (BAU), two cases with - and without Mechanical Vapour Re-compression (MVR), reduced the yearly final energy use by 50 % and 33 % with a simple payback time of 6.2 years and 7.3 years respectively. The third case, concerning grassroot implementation of MVR for evaporation and distillation, and local, off-the-shelf heat pump systems, reduced the yearly final energy use by 69 %. The implementation of the technologies in the third case was gradual implemented through 25 years with a maximum payback time on sub-investments of 3.9 years.

Finally, the article presents the main bottlenecks for electrification learned from the CP Kelco case. The main approach proposed in the general electrification strategy was: (i) replace inefficient technologies with alternative technologies for energy savings, (ii) identify utilisation of heat pumps, and (iii) identify alternative technologies for remaining central utility demands.