Electrification and energy optimization of processes in paper production

Mitigation of global warming, energy security and industrial competitiveness urge the industrial sector to transform its energy use practises. With this regards, implementation of energy efficiency measures, utilization of excess heat and use of electricity from renewable sources for process heat supply are key elements in the energy transition of the industry sector. In this context, Skjern Paper, a paper mill located in Denmark, has always been interested in finding new ways to optimize the energy consumption and minimize the environmental impacts from its paper production processes. This thesis presents an analysis of the electrification and energy optimization opportunities in such paper mill. In this master thesis work, after a detailed energy mapping of the existing system is carried out to identify the potentials for heat recovery and energy efficiency, a set of electrification and direct heat recovery solutions have been found. Among them, only the best performing scenarios were selected to carry over to a detailed analysis with the evaluation of the energy and cost-saving with respect BAU scenario as main objectives. The study showed the presence of multiple electrification and energy optimization opportunities within the case study. Among them, with a considerable reduction in primary energy use, accounted to be potentially more than 14.680 MWh/year, the implementation of an HTHP might play a central role for an efficient energy-saving conversion of the paper mill.