332

G. Schembecker et al.

Tim Seifert
Anna-Katharina Lesniak

Research Article

Stefan Sievers
Gerhard Schembecker
Christian Bramsiepe

Capacity Flexibility of Chemical Plants

Technical University Dortmund,

Department of Biochemical and
Chemical Engineering,
Laboratory of Plant and Process
Design, Dortmund, Germany.

In the light of market uncertainties and globalization, the capacity of fast and
flexible adaption of a chemical plant to changing market conditions becomes a
major necessity in future production scenarios. The capacity flexibility of a plant
can be influenced by oversizing and numbering up of unit operations. The additional costs for these measures have to be compensated for by the financial benefit
arising from the option to adapt to uncertain market demands. Therefore, the additional costs have to be balanced against the gain in flexibility. In this work,
methods for the evaluation of capacity flexibility are adapted from the manufacturing industries to enable a cost-effective design of a modular plant. The evaluation methods are used to select modular plant setups allowing the best compromise between costs and flexibility in different market scenarios.
Keywords: Capacity, Expansion, Flexibility, Modularization, Plant design
Received: September 16, 2013; revised: November 20, 2013; accepted: November 26, 2013
DOI: 10.1002/ceat.201300635

Introduction

In the future, it can be expected that market fluctuations

caused by economic crises or changing customer needs will
influence the chemical and biochemical industries more than
ever. Due to the strong globalization and the dependences on
multiple industrial sectors, the economic cycles of the chemical
industries will become more unpredictable. The economic crisis in 2009 showed the impact of a global economic downturn
on the chemical industry. To be successful in such an economic
environment, a company must be able to react very fast to economic downturns and upswings.
In contrast to this requirement, chemical plants are in most
cases designed for a specific production capacity. The corresponding processes are optimized with regard to investment
and operating costs for this specific capacity. Furthermore, the
development time for such a plant is quite long. In case that
this capacity fits well to the market development, this is the
most cost-efficient way to design a plant. If the market forecast
does not fit to the expected demand development, the investment and operating costs for an adjustment of the plant output are often very high [1]. To avoid this, a different strategy
for plant design is needed. In this strategy, optimization of the
plant toward a specific design capacity is no longer the main
aspect. The target is to design a plant that can be operated
cost-effectively in different demand scenarios. This characteristic of a plant is called capacity flexibility.

Correspondence: Prof. Gerhard Schembecker (gerhard.schembecker

@bci.tu-dortmund.de), Technical University Dortmund, Department of
Biochemical and Chemical Engineering, Laboratory of Plant and Process
Design, Emil-Figge-Str. 70, 44227 Dortmund, Germany.

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In general, flexibility is the ability to change a state with low

expenditures of time, effort, costs, and performance [2].
Capacity flexibility is the ability to adapt the production output to changing market demands [3]. In the light of uncertain
market developments, capacity flexibility is the key to a successful adaption to the uncertain demand. To fulfill the
requirements for a cost-effective and fast adaption of the plant
output, a change in equipment design and selection is needed.
One of the most promising approaches to reduce engineering
time and costs is modularization. In such an approach, apparatuses with fixed sizes are used instead of dedicated equipment. The applicability and benefit of such a concept have
already been demonstrated in the F3 Factory project [4].
Besides the development of a module database, it is necessary
to find ways to combine the modules into a process. The complexity of such a design task depends on the number of unit
operations and the available module sizes. There are two major
design issues for a modular plant. First, the operability of the
selected modules within the process boundaries must be
ensured. Second, the different module combinations must be
compared to select the most economic one. In light of the
changing economic environment, this comparison must be
based on an analysis of capacity flexibility. In such an analysis,
the size and parallel number of modules of each unit operation
is one of the most decisive points. This process information
has to be combined with market information and economic
evaluation. To allow for such an approach, it is necessary to
quantify the capacity flexibility.
Capacity flexibility can be divided into two subgroups,
namely volume flexibility and expansion flexibility [3]. Which
type of flexibility is needed depends on the expected market
scenarios. In the following, these two types and their quantification will be described in more detail.

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333

sary as each unit operation has its own operating range and
A plant with high volume flexibility allows the adaption of
impact on the costs structure. Considering these two points
the plant capacity to market changes without changing the
allows a better control of the size and cost of each expansion
setup, e.g., by adding additional units [5]. Thus, the operating
step.
window of the plant set by the minimal and the maximal reaThe aim of this work is to present a method capable of idenlizable capacity is a measure of volume flexibility. To allow a
tifying the best compromise between capacity flexibility and
comparison between different designs, Gerwin [5], Cheng et
investment costs in a modular plant design. This method
al. [6] and Parker and Wirth [7] developed methods to evalushould be applied in the early stages of process design when
ate the volume flexibility of manufacturing systems. In chemthe decision for or against a modular plant has to be made.
ical engineering, volume flexibility can be related to operaTherefore, methods allowing a quick estimation of the capacity
tional flexibility. This type of flexibility describes a parameter
flexibility with low computational effort are needed. The evalrange under which a plant can be operated by maintaining
uation methods are adapted from strategies in the manufacturspecifications like product purity [8, 9]. In this context,
ing industries. These evaluation methods will be used in a case
Grossman et al. [10] developed a measure for the feasible
study of the continuous production of a recombinant protein.
operating range of a plant for a set of uncertain process
Lastly, it will be shown which method can be applied in differparameters like kinetics or heat transfer coefficients. Based on
ent market scenarios.
this idea, multiple variations of algorithms have been used to
optimize operational flexibility [1113]. Lima et al. [14]
investigated the application of operational flexibility analysis
2 Case Study
for a wide range of example problems for steady-state and
dynamic systems. Malcolm et al. [15] showed the value of
Here, the model process, i.e., a plant for the production of a
combining process design and design of plant control to optirecombinant protein, and different market scenarios for the
mize the operational flexibility of a plant. These publications
following evaluation will be described. A detailed process
allow designing a process that covers a wide uncertainty range
description, the required simulation work, and the assumpof different process parameters under optimal costs. The
tions made can be found in [23]. In the following, only fundamethods can also be used to optimize the operability of the
mental information will be presented.
plant at different capacities. Due to the high complexity of
the methods, the implementation effort for larger process
design is very high.
2.1 Example Process
Expansion flexibility describes the opportunity to adapt the
production output if the market demand increases durably
The flow chart of the process can be seen in Fig. 1. The protein
[3]. In contrast to volume flexibility, additional apparatuses or
is produced by Saccharomyces cerevisiae (bakers yeast) with a
production lines are installed to follow the market demand. In
capacity of 10 t a1 in continuous fermentation (FER). To reach
the field of goods manufacturing industries, evaluation meththe desired cell concentration, the continuous fermentation
ods for expansion flexibility have already been developed
process is usually started in batch mode, followed by a period
[16, 17]. In the chemical engineering literature, the focus lies
of fed-batch operation. A further continuous mode is started
on optimization of expansion strategies based on expected
until the process has to be aborted to avoid gene mutation.
market development and investment costs. The effects of the
The operating costs of continuous fermentation consist of the
operability of the plant at different capacities are often of subcosts for coolant and electric power, oxygen, water, substrate,
ordinate importance. Oldenburg et al. [18] and Wiesner et al.
and cells.
[19] elaborate on the advantage of installing multiple smaller
plants compared to a single plant built for design
capacity. Coleman and York [20] set up a model
for optimizing investment strategies in uncertain
markets. Lier and coworkers showed the benefit of
stepwise plant expansion using discounted cash
flow (DCF) calculations [21] and a real-option
analysis approach [22]. These methods can be used
to find an optimal investment strategy for adapting
to an increasing market with multiple but identical
production lines. The drawback is that economies
of scale limit the adaptability as the investment
costs for multiple smaller plants are much higher
compared to one large-scale plant. Thus, the financial benefit from stepwise expansion is limited by
the high additional costs, and high capacity flexibility cannot be achieved. Here, the modular
approach offers additional options to overcome
this limitation. Therefore, each unit operation has
to be taken into account separately. This is necesFigure 1. Flow sheet of the model process.

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G. Schembecker et al.

Table 1. Input parameters for investment cost calculation [23, 25].

As the product is produced
extracellularly, the next step is to
Unit operation
Cost-determining size Reference size Reference price [$] Degression exponent
separate the cells, applying microfiltration (MF1) and diafiltration
326,700
0.51
Fermenter
volume
10 m3
(DF). In the following ultrafiltraMembrane
tion unit (UF1), water is removed
78,750
0.92
membrane area
50 m2
(UF, DF, MF)
to reduce the volume of the prod71,820
0.22
Mixer-settler
flow rate
36 m3 h1
uct stream for the subsequent
operations. In all cases of membrane filtration, costs for mainteTable 2. Apparatus sizes and BEC for a plant with a capacity of
nance, membrane replacement, cleaning, and energy con10,000 kg a1.
sumption are included. Usually, these costs are proportional to
the membrane area [24]. Additionally, the costs for diafiltration
Unit operation
Optimal size
BEC $
water and wastewater have to be taken into account. These costs
3
can be directly derived from the mass balance. The membrane
Fermentation (FER)
26.16 m
534,000
areas were calculated using the flux of the membrane and the
2
Microfiltration (MF)
13.1 m
23,000
retention of each component. Either a fixed concentration of a
2
Diafiltration (DF)
4.0 m
8,000
component in the retentate or a specific volume reduction of
the feed stream was chosen as target value.
2
204,000
Ultrafiltration 1 (UF1)
140.5 m
Next, other impurities like cell debris and non-product pro2
Ultrafiltration 2 (UF2)
31.8 m
52,000
teins are removed in a two-stage aqueous two-phase extraction
(ATPE). In the ATPE, polyethylene glycol (PEG) and a phosExtraction (EX)
48,000
phate salt are used. Here, the consumption of PEG and the
3 1
Stage 1
0.26 m h
phosphate salt dominate the operating costs. Additionally, the
operating costs include expenses for electricity and wastewater.
Stage 2
0.29 m3 h1
The extraction is described with the help of partitioning coefficients for each component and a phase composition of the
2.2 Scenarios
ATPE system. Finally, the volume of the product stream is
again reduced in an ultrafiltration unit before the product can
The most suitable type and degree of capacity flexibility can
be transferred to a finishing plant.
only be determined, given the expected market development.
Investment costs have been calculated using a capacity-based
Based on this, the volume flexibility has to be determined for a
method. In Eq. (1), CRef1) are the reference costs, SRef is the refgiven setup of apparatuses. In the next step, the volume flexerence size, and n is the degression exponent of a unit operaibility can be optimized in order to cover a range of fluctuation. S is the calculated size of the apparatus. The parameters
tions around the expected market demand. In the scenario for
for the cost functions can be found in Tab. 1. The resulting
the investigation of volume flexibility, we assumed an expected
costs estimated are the bare equipment costs (BEC) and have
capacity of 10 t a1.
to be multiplied with a Lang factor of 6.5 [26] to get the total
In cases with growing markets, the expansion flexibility is
capital investment.

n
used to investigate the adaptability to increasing demands. To
S
show the impact of different market demands on the plant
BEC CRef
(1)
SRef
design, two different scenarios will be investigated. These two
scenarios (S1, S2) will be compared with a base case (BC) with
The sizes and BEC of the unit operations are listed in Tab. 2,
a final design capacity of 10 t a1. The market developments of
optimized for a plant with a design capacity of 10 t a1.
S1, S2, and BC are shown in Fig. 3. The final capacity in S1 is
The cost structures of the investment and the operating costs
15 t a1, and 20 t a1 are reached in S2 as final capacity.
are shown in Fig. 2. The investment costs of $ 5.6 million are
The modularity of the plants is taken into account by using
dominated by the costs for the fermenter and ultrafiltration
fixed apparatus sizes for the different unit operations. These
UF1. The total operating costs are $ 3.2 million a1. The ferapparatus sizes are combined to setups. In the following, three
menter causes nearly 50 % of the operating costs due to the
different setup alternatives will be compared concerning their
costs for raw materials like cells and substrate, while especially
volume and expansion flexibility. The apparatus sizes and
the PEG costs cause the high impact of the extraction step.
numbers of apparatuses used as well as the investment costs of
The operating costs for the first ultrafiltration UF1 and for the
the setups are shown in Tab. 3. All setups achieve the design
diafiltration DF are dominated by the wastewater costs. MF1
capacity of the base case and are the basis for all following
does not lead to wastewater costs. Thus, only membrane
investigations. In setup 1, larger modules are used compared to
replacement and energy costs have to be taken into considerathe other setups. Thus, the number of parallel units needed to
tion. In the following, a product price of $ 3000 kg1 is assumed.
achieve design capacity is low. Furthermore, overdesign in setups 2 and 3 is higher than in setup 1. Based on the module
combination, it can be assumed that setups 2 and 3 will pro
vide higher volume flexibility. The aim of the evaluation meth1) List of symbols at the end of the paper.

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335

Thus, the basis for the evaluation of volume flexibility must be an investigation of the operating
window of each unit operation.
Cheng et al. [6] described such an evaluation of
operating windows for flanged shafts. In their
example, volume flexibility depends on the number of shafts that can be produced in a certain
time. The production time in one process step for
one shaft depends on the time needed to achieve
the final diameter of the shaft on a turning lathe.
Furthermore, it has to be ensured that the following machines can handle the variety in shaft diameters and have a capacity matching with the other
machines in the manufacturing process. These two
Figure 2. Operating cost structure (left diagram) and investment cost structure
characteristics set the feasible capacity range [6].
(right diagram) optimized for a capacity of 10 t a1.
This idea can be transferred to the field of chemical engineering. However, the number of produced pieces has to be translated into a production output in
mass per time as the measure for the feasible capacity range.
This capacity range is limited by apparatus design and process
requirements. To keep an operating point inside these boundaries, the process parameters have to be adapted. The individual operating windows of each apparatus can be combined to
get the operating envelope of the overall plant as it was presented by Cheng et al. [6]. This operating envelope is set by
the unit operation with the lowest maximum and the highest
minimum capacities. The wideness and the values of the
bounds of the operating envelope depend on the selected apparatus type and the size and number of the parallel apparatuses of each unit operation in the process. Thus, the module
combination is the lever to influence volume flexibility. Fig. 4
Figure 3. Market development for the investigated scenarios.
shows an example for the determination of an operating envelope from operating windows.
ods, which will be presented in the next section, must be to
investigate the tradeoff between the achieved flexibility and the
resulting increase in investment costs.

Flexibility Analysis

In this section, different methods for the evaluation of volume

and expansion flexibility will be described. The expected
demand uncertainty can be derived, e.g., from historical data
for established products or can be based on a Monte-Carlo
simulation if not enough data is available [19].

3.1 Volume Flexibility

Volume flexibility is determined by the lowest and highest production output that can be achieved with a given plant setup.

Figure 4. Schematic diagram for the determination of an operating envelope.

Table 3. Setups used for the flexibility evaluation.

FER [m3]

MF [m2]

DF [m2]

UF1 [m2]

UF2 [m2]

1 40

1 20

15

8 20

2 20

2 0.36

7.1 million

2 25

2 10

61

10 20

5 10

4 0.36

10.3 million

3 15

2 10

61

10 20

5 10

4 0.36

11.4 million

Setup

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EX [m3 h1] Investment costs $

To set the change in volume flexibility in relationship to the necessary expansion, a mathematical
description for volume flexibility is
needed. In this way, a tradeoff
between the costs for changes in
plant design by numbering up and

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G. Schembecker et al.

oversizing and the impact on volume flexibility can be identified.

To quantify the volume flexibility VF, a method developed
by Parker and Wirth [7] has been adapted. In this method, the
volume flexibility VF (Eq. (2)) is described by the difference
between the upper and the lower bound of the operating envelope (Cmax Cmin) divided by the upper bound. Production
lines with fixed production output have a value of 0. Systems
with very high volume flexibility have a value near 1.
VF

Cmax Cmin
;
Cmax

(2)

if Cmin < CBreakEven then Cmin CBreakEven

If the lower capacity bound Cmin is below breakeven capacity, CBreakEven has to be set as new lower limit of the operating
envelope. The breakeven capacity is the capacity where the
revenues equal the production costs. Below this capacity, the
revenues are no longer high enough to cover the expenditures
[27]. Consequently, the option to operate a plant below breakeven capacity does not bring any additional benefit.
To calculate the breakeven capacity, the net sales and the
variable and fixed costs have to be determined. It is obvious
that the variable costs will increase if the production output
increases [27]. In most cases, the relationship between variable
costs and output is nearly linear. This is particularly the case if
the variable costs are dominated by raw material costs.
In case of the example process, the variable costs are made
up of production costs, transportation costs (9.5 % of the
sales), and license fees (2 % of the sales). Fixed costs are calculated in dependence on the plant investment costs. They
include depreciation (10 % of the total capital investment
(TCI)), site-related costs (2 % of TCI), maintenance (4 % of
TCI), insurance (1.5 % of TCI), and personnel costs. Furthermore, sales costs (2.5 % of the sales), administrative expenses
(2.5 % of the sales), and research expenses (2.5 % of the sales)
are accounted to the fixed costs [26].
Using the evaluation of VF with the given equation, setups
with a low Cmin are rated higher than setups with a high Cmax.
To pay attention to VF at higher capacities, Cmin should be
replaced by a fixed minimum capacity. This Cmin could be,
e.g., a capacity that was estimated for the market entry of a
new product or a minimum expected capacity derived from
historical market data.

3.2

Expansion Flexibility

Evaluation of the expansion flexibility EF can be used to identify the plant design that allows the most cost-efficient and
flexible adaption to a long-term market development. In the
following, two evaluation methods for EF will be adapted from
methods used in the manufacturing industry.
The first method was developed by Rogalski [17] who proposes a capacity-based method to rate EFRogalski comparable to
the factor for volume flexibility described above (Eq. (2)).
Rogalski describes the value for EFRogalski as the difference
between the target capacity Ctarget and the new breakeven

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capacity CBreakEven,new divided by the difference between the

maximum capacity before expansion Cmax,old and the corresponding breakeven capacity CbreakEven,old (Eq. (3)). If the
technical minimum capacity Cmin is higher than the breakeven
capacity, CBreakEven is replaced by Cmin.
EFRogalski

Ctarget CBreakEven;new
;
Cmax;old CBreakEven;old

(3)

if Cmin > CBreakEven then CBreakEven Cmin

A high EFRogalski is generated if the difference between the
target capacity and the maximum capacity before expansion is
high and the change in breakeven capacity is small. The change
in breakeven capacity is caused by the costs for the additional
apparatuses as the fixed costs increase, e.g., by an increase in
depreciation or higher personnel costs. This fact is described
in Fig. 5 showing an exemplary breakeven diagram. If the new
capacity range (Ctarget CbreakEven,new) is larger than the old
capacity range (Cmax,old CBreakEven,old), the volume flexibility
is improved by the expansion. Such systems have an EFRogalski
above 1. A value of EFRogalski below 1 indicates that the volume
flexibility is reduced by the expansion step. Such a development should be avoided.

Figure 5. Breakeven diagram describing the change in the flexibility range according to Rogalski [17].

The expansion flexibility according to Jacob [16] is used to

evaluate the long-run profit of an expandable system. This
method should be applied if the market demand is expected to
increase constantly and if the final capacity is not uncertain. A
system with high expansion flexibility approximates the economic value achievable with an ideally adapted plant. The idea
of Jacob [16] was adapted by Sethi and Sethi [3], resulting in
Eq. (4), which describes the expansion flexibility EFJacob of a
system using the annual profit as the comparison criterion.
EFJacob

PE
PI

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PN
PN

(4)

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Plant design

In this equation, the different profits P achievable with an

expanded system E, a not expanded system N, and an ideal system I are compared. The ideal system offers an optimal production capacity at each point in the time horizon. The not
expanded system describes the achievable profit if the system
is not expanded. The resulting EFJacob has a value between 1
for total flexibility and 0 for no expansion flexibility.
As the basic idea of this method is to evaluate manufacturing systems, an adaption to chemical engineering design is
needed. Market development is taken into account by applying
DCF calculations, giving the profit of I, N, and E at the end of
the time horizon. In DCF calculations, cash flows depending
on the actual market demand of each year are estimated. These
cash flows are discounted to todays value. The sum of all cash
flows results in the net present value (NPV), which is used as
value for the profit. Plant expansions are included as a new
investment into DCF calculations. The decision variable setting
the time for expansion depends on the business case. In cases
with a lead strategy, additional capacities would be installed
before the maximum capacity of the plant is reached. In lag
strategies, one would wait until the upper limit of the operating envelope is reached.
The ideal system I is represented by a plant designed for the
final capacity in each of the two scenarios so that economies of
scale are fully used. Such an ideal system would be built if the
increase in market demand was foreseen during the planning
period. The expanded plant E is a plant that was previously
designed for design capacity of the base case but is expanded
to reach the new final demand. The not expanded system N
has the same design as E but without expansion. The resulting
DCF curves for the three plants I, N, and E are shown exemplarily in Fig. 6.

Figure 6. Schematic diagram of calculated NPV for the expanded

system E, the not expanded system N, and the ideal system I.

As operating time and investment costs vary for the systems,

the NPV cannot be compared directly. To allow for a comparison, the equivalent annual annuity (EAA) is used, transforming the NPV into an annual annuity. Eq. (5) shows how the
EAA is calculated. r is the discount rate and t is the project lifetime, which is the time span after production start.
EAA

rNPV
1 r

(5)

Eq. (6) is the resulting equation for calculation of EFJacob

using EAA.

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EFJacob

EAAE
EAAI

EAAN
EAAN

337

(6)

As the future market development will differ from the forecasts made during plant design, it is necessary to take different
scenarios into account. These scenarios represent different possible market developments. EF is calculated for different setups
in each of the scenarios. By this, it is possible to evaluate which
of the setups achieves the highest EF in most of the market scenarios. Furthermore, it is possible to take market decreases
into account. In this way, also a stop of the expansion plan can
be respected and evaluated.

Results

In this part, the presented methods are used to investigate the

volume and expansion flexibilities of the plant setups given in
Tab. 3, in the scenarios described in Sect. 2.2. The aim is to
identify the setups giving the best compromise between costs
and flexibility under the given boundary conditions.

4.1

Evaluation of Volume Flexibility

Before volume flexibility and costs can be set into relation, an

evaluation of the operating windows of each unit operation is
needed to set the boundaries of the operating envelope. To
avoid an increase in operating costs, operating conditions like
volume reduction by the membranes or extraction yields are
kept in their optimum range. Thus, it is necessary to identify
operating parameters that allow for a control of the operating
conditions. The range in which the operating parameters can
be adapted depends on the design of the apparatus. In the following, the limiting operating parameters of the example process and their range will be described first. After that, the volume flexibility will be calculated and compared for the three
setups presented in Tab. 3.
In case of the fermentation, the residence time must be kept
constant in order to keep up the optimal product yield. To realize higher or lower capacities with a fixed fermenter size, the
filling level can be adapted. The optimal filling level is 70 % of
the total fermenter volume. The highest filling level that can be
realized is 85 % of the total fermenter volume. Above this value, foam formation caused by gassing and cell debris cannot
be handled anymore. Below a certain filling level, an optimal
mixing is no longer guaranteed. This lower level depends on
the design of the fermenter. In this case, we assume a minimum filling level of 50 %.
In case of ultrafiltrations UF1 and UF2, a minimum volume
reduction is required to keep the size of the following unit
operations at an acceptable value. The concentrations of product in the retentates of MF1 and DF1 have a high influence on
the product recovery, which would increase the operating
costs. With the help of the transmembrane pressure, membranes
can be controlled under different loads [24]. It was assumed that
the optimum operation of the membrane modules is achieved at
90 % of the maximum achievable flux to keep 10 % of spare capacity. The minimum flux is set to 50 % of the maximum flux.

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G. Schembecker et al.

The two-stage ATPE is carried out in two horizontal mixer-settler units. For total phase separation a certain settling time is needed. To ensure
this settling time, it must be guaranteed that the
settling velocity of the dispersed droplets is lower
than the velocity of the continuous phase [28].
The needed settling time is provided by the design
of the settler by adapting the length, diameter, and
position of the interphase. As the velocity of the
continuous phase depends on the volume flow of
the feed stream, the residence time must be higher
at higher loads. As the settler design limits the settling time, overdesign and numbering up must be
Figure 8. Resulting operating envelope for each alternative.
used to operate the settler at higher loads as well.
The capacity of the mixer is limited by a minimum
residence time that has to be achieved for good mixing [28].
leads to lower investment costs. Thus, the difference in investIn case of apparatuses operated in parallel, it is possible to
ment costs between setup 1 and the other setups is mainly gentemporarily shut down some of the units. This opportunity
erated by economies of scale with regard to the fermenter.
has to be taken into account to estimate the lower bound of
However, using only one fermenter limits the lower bound of
the operating window. Fig. 7 shows the achievable capacity
the operating envelope of setup 1 compared to the other setlimits for continuous fermenters operated in parallel, with difups. Furthermore, oversizing in setup 1 is low so that the upper
ferent sizes and numbers of parallel units. To keep the resibound of the operating envelope is also smaller compared to
dence time constant, the filling level can be adapted in the
the other setups. Setup 3 has the widest operating envelope,
range between 50 and 85 % of the total volume. Compared to
but at the same time the highest investment costs of the setups
one 40-m3 fermenter, it is possible to reduce the lower reaction
investigated.
volume from 20 to 4 m3 if five 8-m3 fermenters are used. Using
For the example process, the breakeven capacity is approxitwo 25-m3 fermenters enables an increase of the maximal reacmately 4.6 t a1 for setup 1 and 5.0 t a1 for setups 2 and 3. Thus,
tion volume to 42.5 m3. From this example, it can be seen that
the operating envelopes of setup 2 (Cmin = 4.8 t a1) and setup 3
the apparatus size and numbering up are the degrees of free(Cmin = 3.8 t a1) are limited by their breakeven capacity. Setdom to influence the volume flexibility.
up 1 has a minimum capacity Cmin of 7.7 kt a1. Consequently,
the volume flexibility generated by numbering up cannot be
fully used and additional investment for higher flexibility does
not totally pay off.
Setup 1 has a VF of 0.4, which is the lowest of all setups.
With an additional investment of $ 3 million for setup 2, a VF
of 0.68 can be achieved, which is a significant increase of the
operating envelope. Setup 3 has a VF of 0.65, which is lower
than the one of setup 2. The reason for this is the limitation of
the lower bound of the operating envelope by the breakeven
capacity. Therefore, designs with a Cmin below the breakeven
point should be avoided to allow for an economic utilization
of the installed equipment also at the lower bound of the operating envelope.
Based on these results, it is possible to select a setup dependent on the uncertainty in market demand. The operating en3
Figure 7. Fermenter capacity for different sizes (8, 25, and 8 m )
velope of the plant must be high enough to cover the range of
and the number of parallel units (1, 2, and 5) depending on the
uncertainty. In cases with a low market uncertainty, setup 1
filling level.
should be preferred as its investment costs are the lowest of all
setups. If high uncertainties in market demand are expected,
Fig. 8 shows the resulting operating envelopes for each setup
setup 2 should be selected as it provides a compromise between
presented in Tab. 3. The three radar charts show the differences
the flexibility and costs of the three setups. Setup 3 has the
between the operating window of a unit and the operating
highest investment costs but the flexibility does not pay off.
envelope of the whole setup. The axes of the diagram represent
Thus, this setup should not be used at all.
the percentage of design capacity. 100 % is equal to the design
capacity of 10 t a1. With the help of these diagrams, it is possible to identify capacity bottlenecks.
4.2 Evaluation of Expansion Flexibility
The fermenter has a relatively low digression exponent of
0.51 (see Tab. 1) and the highest share in investment costs (see
The expansion flexibilities of the three setups presented in
Fig. 2). This means that the use of larger fermenter modules
Tab. 3 were evaluated for two different expansion scenarios

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Chem. Eng. Technol. 2014, 37, No. 2, 332342

Plant design

339

Table 5. Upper bound of the operating envelope after expansion.

(see Fig. 3) with the help of the two methods
described in Sect. 2. The first scenario is an expanSetup
FER [t a1] MF [t a1]
DF [t a1]
UF1 [t a1] UF2 [t a1] EX [t a1]
sion to 15 t a1, and the second one to 20 t a1. The
same apparatus sizes as already used in the setups
Scenario 1: Expansion to 15 t a1
shall be installed only to achieve the new target
1
26.0
17.0
27.6
15.9
21.0
20.7
capacity. This allows for a short implementation
time as the engineering for the units has already
2
16.2
17.0
16.5
15.8
17.4
20.7
been done. Therefore, it is assumed that the Lang
3
19.5
17.0
16.5
15.8
17.4
20.7
factor can be reduced to 4 as the engineering effort
1
Scenario 2: Expansion to 20 t a
is reduced. Tab. 4 shows the additional number of
units for each process step needed to reach the
1
26.0
34.0
27.6
20.6
21.0
20.7
capacities of both scenarios. As the operating
2
24.3
25.5
22.0
20.6
21.0
20.7
envelopes of the plants are taken into account, the
number of installed equipment items can be
3
24.3
25.5
22.0
20.6
21.0
20.7
reduced. Tab. 5 shows the upper bound of the operating window of each unit operation after expansion.
leading to higher economies of scale compared to the other
To apply the method of Rogalski, an investigation of the
setups. The values for EF that can be derived from the ranges
operating windows and breakeven capacity for each setup in
in Fig. 6 are listed in Tab. 6. As setup 2 already fulfills the target
the different scenarios is needed. The expansion steps are
capacity in S1, it is not possible to calculate EFRogalski. Setups 2
referred to the base case scenario with a capacity of 10 t a1.
and 3 can keep the size of their capacity ranges, leading to valAdditional investment for the expansion increases the depreues for EFRogalski of around 1. In case of setup 1, the wideness
ciation and fixed costs, which results in an increase in the
of the capacity range is increased as EFRogalski is above 1. In S2,
breakeven capacity. The variable costs, on the other hand, are
setup 1 achieves a high EFRogalski of 2.2. This value is also highnot affected by the expansion in this example. Given the
er than the value achieved by setup 1 in scenario 1. The reason
change in the breakeven capacity for the expansion scenarios 1
for this is that the new target capacity in scenario 2 is higher
(S1) and 2 (S2), the changes in the flexibility range compared
compared to scenario 1, but the difference between the new
to the base case (BC) can be calculated. These changes are
breakeven capacity and the minimal capacity is small.
shown in Fig. 9.
The results lead to a similar statement as it was found based
In both scenarios, all setups can reach the new target capacion the evaluation of volume flexibility. If the flexibility range is
ty. The lower bound of the flexibility range is moving away
limited by the breakeven capacity, additional investment into
from Cmin due to the change in breakeven capacity. The highhigher flexibility does not pay off. If the breakeven point is
est change can be seen for Setup 3. Furthermore, the change in
shifted to higher capacities due to an expansion, the difference
the lower bound is also the highest as the increase in investto the technically feasible capacity is increased. The most effecment is higher compared to the other setups.
tive way to expand a plant and maintain the operating range is
Setup 1 is limited in the base case and in scenario 1 by the
to limit the increase in breakeven capacity. Here, the selection
smallest technically feasible capacity, and not by its breakeven
of the starting setup has a major impact if modules of the same
capacity as is the case for setups 2 and 3. Only in case of S2,
size are used for the expansion. Consequently, the method of
the Cmin of setup 1 is smaller than the breakeven capacity.
Rogalski is very useful as an additional evaluation besides volHowever, this change is relatively small as the additional
ume flexibility to identify the most suitable setup. Different
investment costs for the expansion are comparably low for this
possible scenarios with different new target capacities should
setup. The reason for this is the large size of the fermenter,
be compared as shown in the
example.
Table 4. Installed modules and resulting investment costs for capacity expansion.
To investigate EF according to
the idea of Jacob, a DCF calculaSetup
FER [m3]
MF [m2]
DF [m2]
UF1 [m2]
UF2 [m2] EX [m3 h1] Additional
investment [$]
tion is needed. The time horizon is
15 years and the discount rate is
1
Scenario 1: Expansion to 15 t a
12 % for all cases. Plant operation
1
+1 40
0
+1 5
+2 20
+1 20
+2 0.36
3.5 million
is started as soon as the market
demand reaches the lower bound
2
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.0 million
of the operating window, or rather
3
+1 15
0
0
0
0
0
1.6 million
the breakeven capacity of a setup.
1
At this point in time, the setups for
Scenario 2: Expansion to 20 t a
a design capacity of 10 t a1 shown
1
+1 40
+1 20
+1 5
+5 20
+1 20
+2 0.36
6.4 million
in Tab. 3 are installed. In the year
in which the upper bound of the
2
+1 25
+1 10
+2 1
+3 20
+1 10
0
4.6 million
operating window is reached, the
3
+2 15
+1 10
+2 1
+3 20
+1 10
0
6.8 million
expansion is executed.

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340

G. Schembecker et al.

Figure 9. Change in flexibility range due to capacity expansion

for scenarios 1 (S1) and 2 (S2) compared to the base case (BC).
Table 6. Expansion flexibility for both scenarios.
Setup

Scenario 1

Scenario 2

EFRogalski

EFJacob

EFRogalski

EFJacob

1.5

0.2

2.2

0.7

0.7

1.0

0.8

1.1

0.6

1.1

0.7

the higher investment costs of these setups compared to setup 1 and lead to a higher NPV. In the evaluation method
according to Rogalski, this benefit was considered as only the
expansion step itself was investigated. In this case, the lower
capacity limit of setups 2 and 3 is a major advantage, and the
financial benefits generated until expansion is needed can be
fully used.
EF of setup 1 is much higher in scenario 2 than in scenario 1.
The reasons for this are the additional investment costs for the
expansion that arise from the available module size. In both
scenarios, one 40-m3 fermenter is needed to reach the new
design capacities. While in scenario 2 this fermenter size fits
well to the new design capacity, in scenario 1 the overdesign of
this fermenter is too large, leading to high costs for the expansion. Thus, the difference in EAA between E and N of setup 1
in scenario 1 increases by only $ 0.3 million a1. In the case of the
other two setups, this increase is in the range of $ 1.3 million a1.
Consequently, in scenario 1, most of the additional income is
needed to pay for the expansion. In scenario 2, the economies
in scale of setup 1 are higher as compared to the other setups,
due to the larger fermenters. Therefore, parts of the profit generated by the time advantage of setups 2 and 3 are compensated for by the lower investment costs of setup 1. This trend
will be even more pronounced in scenarios with expansions to
even higher capacities.
To sum up, the results calculated with the method of Jacob
show the interaction between the demand development and
the apparatus sizes used. The adapted method allows a comparison between different market situations and enables the
decision for the setup with the highest expansion flexibility
with regard to long-run profit. In the given example, setup 2
with the higher numbering up should be preferred in the
expansion scenarios up to a doubling of the design capacity. In
scenarios with higher final capacities, setup 1 should be preferred as oversizing of the fermenter reduces the additional
investment costs required for further capacity increases.

5
The results of the EF evaluation can be seen in Tab. 6. The
calculated EAA are shown in Tab. 7. In contrast to the EF analysis using the method of Rogalski, setups 2 and 3 have a higher
expansion flexibility than setup 1 in both market scenarios.
This means that these two setups allow a more precise adaption to the market development than setup 1. One reason is
that production can be started earlier with setups 2 and 3, due
to the lower bound of the operating window compared to setup 1. The earnings made by this earlier start compensate for
Table 7. EAA (in $ million a1) for the different scenarios.
Setup

Scenario 1

Scenario 2

EAA(N)

EAA(E)

EAA(I)

EAA(N)

EAA(E)

10.4

10.7

12.1

13.3

16.2

10.0

11.5

12.1

12.8

16.4

10.0

11.2

12.1

12.8

16.1

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Fields of Application

All methods described in this article help to evaluate the

adaptability of the plant capacity in volatile markets, but the
different methods aim at different market situations. These
market situations can be described by the factors demand and
uncertainty. The possible demand covers the range from a constant market with a more or less fixed demand to a strongly
growing market. The uncertainty gives the range in which the
demand can vary. The classification with exemplary markets is
shown on the left-hand side of Fig. 10. The diagram on the right side of Fig. 10 shows which of
the methods should be used for evaluation.
If the market demand is expected to be constant
and the uncertainty is low, the volume flexibility
should be used to select the most suitable setup.
EAA(I)
The operating envelope can be adapted as close as
17.3
possible to the expected range of fluctuation to
minimize investment costs. If the market uncer17.3
tainty is higher for a nearly constant market, a
17.3
combination of VF and EF based on Rogalskis

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Chem. Eng. Technol. 2014, 37, No. 2, 332342

Plant design

341

Figure 10. Fields of application for the different evaluation methods.

method should be applied. In this case, the volume flexibility

can be used to generate basic setups that meet the lower expected market demand. Based on these setups, EF can be evaluated using the method of Rogalski in different expansion scenarios.
If the market is expected to grow, a more dynamic calculation based on the method of Jacob is needed. This method
allows the evaluation of investment splitting over a defined
time horizon. In this way, the best investment strategy for a
given setup can be determined. To respect higher uncertainties
in an estimated market development, EF according to Jacob
can be calculated for different setups in different scenarios.

Acknowledgment
The research leading to the results presented in this paper has
received funding from the European Communitys 7th Framework Program under grant agreement no. 228867, F3 Factory.

Conclusion and Outlook

Three different methods for the evaluation of capacity flexibility of modular plants were presented. The first method allows
the investigation of the volume flexibility by analyzing the
operating range of each apparatus within the plant. Capacity
bottlenecks can be identified and additional costs for increasing the volume flexibility can be calculated. This makes the
presented method for volume flexibility evaluation very useful
for the design of modular plants, e.g., in seasonally volatile
markets. The evaluation methods according to Rogalski and
Jacob are related to expansion flexibility and help to integrate
future expansion scenarios in modular plant design. The method adapted from Rogalski [17] can be applied as an extension
for assessment with volume flexibility. The method adapted
from Jacob [3, 16] describes the long-term profit of an expansion scenario with the help of a DCF calculation and is especially useful in scenarios with strongly growing markets where
expansion can generate a significant economic benefit.
In future works, the methods presented should be used to
optimize plant setups concerning costs and flexibility. In this
way, a coupling with the process design phase can be achieved
by integrating the flexibility analysis into the process simula-

Chem. Eng. Technol. 2014, 37, No. 2, 332342

tion. Furthermore, the evaluation of EF according to Rogalski

should be further expanded, e.g., by introducing probabilities
of occurrence for each market development and weighting the
EF of each scenario. In this way, it is possible to find the setup
allowing the best adaption for uncertain market demands.
Furthermore, criteria for the evaluation of a staged shutdown
of a modular plant have to be developed. Therefore, new business models for modular plants, like the leasing of units, have
to be evaluated.

The authors have declared no conflict of interest.

Symbols used
BEC
C
Cmax
Cmin
CRef
EAA
EFJacob

[$]
[t a1]
[t a1]
[t a1]
[$]
[$ a1]
[]

EFRogalski []
n
NPV
P
r
S

[]
[$]
[$]
[]
[m3, m2]

bare equipment costs

capacity
maximal capacity
minimal capacity
reference costs
equivalent annual annuity
expansion flexibility according to
Jacob
expansion flexibility according to
Rogalski
degression exponent
net present value
profit
discount rate
apparatus size

2014 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

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342

Sref
t
VF

G. Schembecker et al.

[m3, m2]
[a]
[]

reference size
time
volume flexibility

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Chem. Eng. Technol. 2014, 37, No. 2, 332342