An autonomous artificial designer of thermal energy systems. II: Solution algorithm

A knowledge-based approach to automated conceptual design (flowsheet synthesis) of thermal energy systems with strong interactions between heat/power/chemical transformations is presented. An algorithm is presented. The algorithm makes use of the state evaluation function, transformation operators, and the plausible move operator to search through a space of the design states. A simple closed-cycle gas turbine is employed to illustrate the behavior of the «artificial designer» as it advances from a certain given design to more sophisticated schemes