Abstract: A method of determining a fouling location of a shell and tube heat exchanger is provided. Under the method, a simulation model of the heat exchanger is partitioned into multiple segments. Each segment corresponds to a different one of multiple operating scenarios of the heat exchanger. For each operating scenario, temperature data and pressure drop data are generated from the simulation model of the heat exchanger. The fouling location of the heat exchanger corresponds to a respective segment in each of the multiple operating scenarios. The temperature data and the pressure drop data are classified based on the multiple segments of the simulation model by inputting the temperature data and the pressure drop data to one or more machine learning classification algorithms. The fouling location and a value of accumulated fouling at the fouling location are determined based on the classified temperature data and the classified pressure drop data.

Abstract: This disclosure presents methods and systems of controlling a counter flow double pipe heat exchanger (DPHE) that includes a hot fluid pipe and a cold fluid pipe. In a method, a temperature error between a reference temperature and a temperature at an outlet of the hot fluid pipe of the counter flow DPHE is determined. A cold fluid mass flow rate is determined from an output of a proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller based on the temperature error being input to the PID controller. The cold fluid mass flow rate is used for a cold fluid in the cold fluid pipe of the counter flow DPHE. The temperature error is controlled within a predefined range by utilizing parameters of the PID controller that are set by using a harmony search algorithm (HSA) to obtain a minimization of a cost function.