Optimal design of multi-period process networks including storages for renewable resources

During the design of process systems seasonal effects on demands and available resources cannot be avoided. Due to this characteristic the capacity and seasonal load of an operation or operating unit has to be distinguished during modeling. In 2014 the P-graph methodology was expanded by Heckl et al. for optimal design of multi-period operations. The results show that the production units in multi-periodic systems need to have higher capacity than the average load because of the requirements derived from the time periods. This increase of capacity causes a significant increment in cost as well. In the present work to reduce the gap between the required capacities and the average loads, storage units are involved in the design of the cost optimal process network. Modeling season dependent storage costs and storage losses are incorporated to the multi-periodic P-graph approach.