Using Recovered Heat for Effluent and Boiler Makeup Water
FLU-ACE™ operates within this brewery’s utility system, capturing residual low-grade heat from boiler exhaust and transferring it into controlled hot water, displacing gas-fired heat on established site duties.
The system operates on the exhaust from three existing 16 tonne per hour (35,000 lb/hr) steam boilers, downstream of existing boiler-side heat recovery. Even after this earlier heat recovery stage, the system recovers an average of approximately 740 kW (2.5 MMBtu/hr) and delivers this heat to two defined plant loads: effluent heating for the wastewater treatment plant and boiler makeup water preheating.
Effluent heating provides the larger load, with FLU-ACE™ delivering approximately 600 kW (2.0 MMBtu/hr) to heat an average flow of 76 m³/hr (~335 gpm) from 24°C to 33°C (75°F to 91°F) before it reaches the site’s water-to-water effluent heat exchanger. The second load is boiler makeup water preheating, with approximately 140 kW (0.5 MMBtu/hr) used to raise 2.1 m³/hr (~9 gpm) of makeup water from 18°C to 80°C (64°F to 176°F) before it enters the existing steam boiler system.
By recovering heat from existing boiler exhaust and applying it to these lower-temperature duties, FLU-ACE™ reduces demand on the steam boilers while keeping the brewery’s existing steam raising plant and production process in place.
For a brewing group working towards net zero production across its global operations, this is the practical value of an efficiency-first approach: reducing the thermal load of existing assets now, lowering the fuel and emissions baseline, and improving the viability of future low-carbon heat options.
