SIMULTANEOUS-MODULAR APPROACH TO ELECTROLYTIC PROCESS OPTIMIZATION USING ASPEN.

Electrolytic processes are a new and challenging application for the methodology of process optimization, in part because physical property relationships tend to be highly nonideal in the presence of electrolytes. The public version of ASPEN has recently been modified to provide an enhanced capability for the simulation of electrolytic processes. However, attempts at process optimization proved very inefficient since an outer optimization loop was required when using ASPEN. We have thus modified ASPEN so that a simultaneous-modular approach to process optimization could be used. The actual optimization algorithm used was the enhanced Han-Powell algorithm, SQPHP.