CAPE-OPEN and Heat Exchanger Networks

In a paper published this month in Chemical Engineering Transactions, researchers from the Centre for Process Integration and intensification at University of Pannonia in Hungary, have proposed an object oriented model and a prototype file storage format primarily for Heat Exchanger Network (HEN) related tasks. The class models they are proposing show much similarity with CAPE-OPEN objects like Unit Operations and Material Objects. In their conclusion, the authors are willing to investigate how their approach can be combined with the CAPE-OPEN initiative in order to achieve interoperability with the software tools which are implementing CAPE-OPEN.

CO-LaN welcomes the willingness shown to make use of CAPE-OPEN for HEN calculations. Indeed pinch analysis could be achieved through the Flowsheet Monitoring interface specification under development.

The authors focus alarge part of their proposal on data exchange format. If CAPE-OPEN was inspired in its early days by PDXI for example which is a data exchange format, CAPE-OPEN is there to achieve interoperability between pieces of software at runtime. CAPE-OPEN does not define a data format for storage, it is defining how to access data, how to perform actions on other pieces of software. For sure CAPE-OPEN may be used together with other technologies like standardized storage format or ontologies, in order to improve flexibility and ease-of-use of CAPE software tools.