Waste Heat Recovery
Waste heat recovery captures heat that would otherwise be rejected — from flue gas, exhaust, hot products or cooling streams — and puts it to useful work such as preheating, raising steam or generating power. It pays best with a high-grade source and a coincident demand.
A large share of industrial fuel ends up as rejected heat. Recovery technologies include economisers, recuperators, waste-heat boilers, heat exchangers, heat pumps and Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) power generation. The key is matching the temperature grade of the waste heat to a real, time-coincident demand, and accounting for fouling in dirty exhausts.
Related terms
Energy Management System (EnMS / EMS)
Related guides
Waste heat recovery in industry
Where industrial waste heat hides, the technologies that capture it, and how to judge whether recovery pays at your site.
How to improve boiler efficiency
The practical levers that move boiler efficiency — combustion, blowdown, feedwater, flue-gas heat and standing losses — and how to find them.