Multi-Objective Optimization of Plate-Fin Heat Exchanger by Bees Algorithm: Thermal-Economic Design

Multi-objective (MO) optimization of Bees Algorithm (BA) issimultaneously employed to acquire the maximum effectiveness and theminimum total annual cost (TAC) of a heat exchanger (HE) as twocontradict objectives in current investigation. For a non-trivial MOproblem, there is not just single solution that simultaneously optimizeseach of the objects, but there exist a set of solutions are called Paretooptimal fronts. Therefore, MO optimization has been used for obtaininga series of optimum solutions which contradict between highereffectiveness and lower TAC. Main parameters considered in currentoptimization problem include: pitch, height, and offset length of the fin,hot and cold stream flow lengths, and no-flow length. Effects of thesegeometric variables on each objective function (OF) are investigated bya sensitivity analysis. Finally, the MOBA optimization results aresuccessfully validated through an illustrative case study taken fromliterature. Maximum effectiveness obtained in current study is 1.5% and1.2% higher than NSGA-II and TLBO, respectively and minimum TACis 6.1% and 4.1% lower than NSGA-II and TLBO, respectively. Themajor superiority of present study is that a wide range of optimumsolutions has been obtained and so, designers are capable to select thebest design variables.

Keywords:

Plate-fin heat exchanger , Optimization , Thermo-economic design , Bees Algorithm , Effectiveness