ABSTRACT
In recent years, the mismanagement of natural resources (such as the overextraction of water resources), population growth, industrial pollution problems, and climate change are pressing problems to the global community (Sandia National Laboratories, 2005; Rockstrom et al., 2009). For instance, it is expected that approximately 40% of the global population will live in areas of severe water stress by 2050 (WWAP, 2014). The efficient use of industrial resources has become an important element to ensure both environmental and business sustainability. Many problems pertaining to efficient use of resources in industrial process plants share common features, which allow them to be handled using a common family of systematic techniques known collectively as process integration. One of the widely accepted definitions for process integration is given as a holistic approach to process design, retrofitting and operation which emphasises the unity of the process (El-Halwagi, 2006, p. 15).
