A Multicriteria Decision Framework for the Selection of Biomass Separation Equipment

Abstract

For the first time, a two‐stage decision support framework for equipment selection, applied to biomass separation, is presented. In the first stage, the framework evaluates from a number of equipment based on the process requirements and outputs only those that offer a technically feasible separation. In the second stage, the analytic hierarchy process is applied for performing a multicriteria decision analysis to select amongst the feasible equipment based on separation performance and energy consumption criteria. This approach systematically considers the relative importance of those different alternatives and selection criteria by pairwise comparisons. The output of the framework is an overall ranking of equipment as well as a sensitivity analysis of the results for different weighting of the criteria. These results can be used to equip practitioners in the field of bioseparations with a tool for making more consistent and better‐informed equipment selection decisions.

Multi-Criteria Decision-Making for Machine Selection in Manufacturing and Construction: Recent Trends

“…The machine selection problem in the raw material processing industry appeared mainly in the selection of the separation machines category. In [10], the problem of selecting a biomass separation machine was addressed. The importance of bio-separation stems from its wide range of industrial applications in food, beverage, wastewater treatment, and chemical and fuel production, to name a few.…”

“…The importance of bio-separation stems from its wide range of industrial applications in food, beverage, wastewater treatment, and chemical and fuel production, to name a few. A 3-step approach was proposed in [10], where the first step is providing information about the gathered process requirements and alternative machines identified. In the second step, the criteria used in assessing the alternatives are defined, and AHP was applied in the last step to rank the alternatives.…”

Modeling the Separation of Microorganisms in Bioprocesses by Flotation

“…High speed centrifugation methods such as disc stack centrifuges result in high forces, which may result in the breakup of microorganisms [9]. Based on the separation performance and energy consumption criteria, hydrocyclones are an alternative to separate microorganisms in the size range of 10 µm [10]. Hydrocyclones have a small footprint and relatively low capital and operating costs [11].…”