ABSTRACT
The last two decades have been characterized by a significant increase in the attention to batch processes in general and in particular to multipurpose batch operations. This is mainly due to the fact that batch processes are inherently flexible, which renders them an ideal choice in volatile or unstable market conditions. These plants easily adapt to changes in product specifications and operating conditions. They are also suitable for producing products of different recipes within the same facility. Despite this advantage, optimum design, synthesis, and scheduling of multipurpose batch plants remain poorly understood. This chapter presents a method that addresses design, synthesis, and scheduling in a holistic manner. As explained in detail in Chapter 2, the scheduling platform has a significant impact on the computational performance of the overall model. Given that optimum design and synthesis of batch plants is dependent on optimum scheduling, it is evident that the scheduling model of choice is of utmost importance in design and synthesis. Consequently, in this chapter, the scheduling model presented in Chapter 2 is adopted due to its proven computational efficiencies. It is hereby extended to incorporate design and synthesis. Furthermore, computational studies are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed model. A comparison with earlier formulations demonstrates that better computational times and objective functions are obtained through this formulation.
