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Energy Performance, Environmental Impacts and Costs of a Drying System: Life Cycle Analysis of Conventional and Heat Recovery Scenarios

TitleEnergy Performance, Environmental Impacts and Costs of a Drying System: Life Cycle Analysis of Conventional and Heat Recovery Scenarios
Publication TypeArticolo su Rivista peer-reviewed
Year of Publication2023
AuthorsUrbano, D.G., Aquino A., and Scrucca Flavio
JournalEnergies
Volume16
ISSN19961073
KeywordsDrying, Drying air, Drying systems, Energy analysis, energy efficiency, Energy performance, Energy utilization, LCA, LCC, life cycle, life cycle analysis, performance, Renewable fuels, System life cycle, Waste heat
Abstract

High energy consumption is one of the main problems of drying, a critical process for many industrial sectors. The optimization of drying energy use results in significant energy saving and has become a topic of interest in recent decades. We investigate benefits of heat recovery in a convective drying system by comparing two different scenarios. The Baseline Scenario is a conventional industrial dryer, and Scenario 1 includes the preheating of drying air by exhausts from the drying chamber. We show that the energy efficiency of the drying cycle is strictly related to the properties of the dried material and operative conditions, and performance improves significantly (by 59% to 87%) when installing a heat recovery unit (Scenario 1). Additionally, the temperature of drying air affects performance. We assess both scenarios by LCA analysis, measuring the environmental impacts and externalities of four different fuels (natural gas, light fuel oil, biomethane, and hardwood chips). Our findings indicate that heat recovery reduces environmental impacts, both when fossil and renewable fuels feed the system, but unexpected impact arises for some categories when renewable fuels are used. © 2023 by the authors.

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URLhttps://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85147855011&doi=10.3390%2fen16031523&partnerID=40&md5=f4f90bb1e44b3502fdfc9f2cf002b3e6
DOI10.3390/en16031523
Citation KeyUrbano2023