1. On EINSTEIN

1.1. Overview

For optimising thermal energy supply in industry, a holistic integral approach is required that includes possibilities of demand reduction by heat recovery and process integration, and by an intelligent combination of efficient heat and cold supply technologies.

EINSTEIN is a tool-kit for fast and high quality thermal energy audits in industry, composed by an audit guide describing the methodology and by a software tool that guides the auditor through all the audit steps.

The main features of EINSTEIN are:

  1. the data processing is based on standardized models for industrial processes and industrial heat supply systems;
  2. special tools allow for fast consistency checking and estimation of missing data, so that already with very few data some first predictions can be made;
  3. semi-automatization: the software tool gives support to decision making for the generation of alternative heat & cold supply proposals, carries out automatically all the necessary calculations, including dynamic simulation of the heat supply system, and creates a standard audit report;
  4. a basic questionnaire helps for systematic collection of the necessary information with the possibility to acquire data by distance.

The software tool includes modules for benchmarking, automatic design of heat exchanger networks, and design assistants for the heat and cold supply system.

The base version of the EINSTEIN expert system software tool is available for free, as an open source software project. This type of software development has shown to be very efficient for dissemination of knowledge and for the continuous maintenance and improvement by user contributions.

Since Version 2.3, in parallel a commercial version EINSTEIN Plus is being developed by energyXperts.NET as a means of fund raising for maintenance and continuous development of the EINSTEIN project.

1.2. Developers

EINSTEIN has been developed by:

Coordination:

  • Hans Schweiger (energyXperts.NET, Barcelona, Spain / Berlin, Germany)

Major contributions to the tool development from:

  • Bettina Muster-Slawitsch (AEE INTEC, Gleisdorf, Austria) [1]
  • Christoph Brunner (AEE INTEC, Gleisdorf, Austria) [1]
  • Claudia Vannoni (energyXperts.NET, Barcelona, Spain / Berlin, Germany) [2]
  • Cristina Ricart (energyXperts.NET, Berlin, Germany)
  • David Baehrens (energyXperts.NET, Barcelona, Spain)
  • Enrico Facci (Universitá di Roma - Sapienza, Rome, Italy)
  • Jan Ries (energyXperts.NET, Berlin, Germany)
  • Stoyan Danov (energyXperts.NET, Barcelona, Spain)
  • Thu Huyen (Joanneum Research, Graz, Austria)
[1](1, 2) until Version 1.1 for Joanneum Research, Graz, Austria
[2]until Version 1.1 for Università di Roma - Sapienza, Rome, Italy

Contributions to the databases:

  • Alexandre Bertrand (CRP Henri Tudor, Luxemburg, Luxemburg): steam data tables (V2.0), chiller database (V2.2).
  • Jonathan Hervieu (CRP Henri Tudor, Luxemburg, Luxemburg): chiller database (V2.2).
  • Damjan Krajnc (University of Maribor, Maribor, Slovenia): benchmark data base (V1.0/1.1).
  • Stefan Craenen (COGEN Europe, Brussels, Belgium): some data on CHP equipment (V1.0/1.1).

Programming tasks:

  • André Rattinger (software developer, Austria, contracted by AEE Intec, Gleisdorf)
  • Andreas Hirczy (software developer, Graz, Austria, contracted by Joanneum Research)
  • Florian Jöbstl (software developer, Graz, Austria, contracted by Joanneum Research)
  • Heiko Henning (Imsai e-Soft, Berlin, Germany, contracted by energyXperts.NET)
  • Tom Sobota (software developer, Madrid, Spain, contracted by energyXperts.NET)
  • NTE Naturenergie.Technology and Engineering GmbH (software development, Graz, Austria)

Testing: (in addition to the above mentioned developers)

  • Jürgen Fluch (AEE INTEC, Gleisdorf, Austria) [3]
  • Matthäus Hubmann (AEE INTEC, Gleisdorf, Austria) [3]
  • Eileen O’Leary (Cork Institute of Technology, Cork, Ireland) [3]
  • Konstantin Kulterer (Austrian Energy Agency, Vienna, Austria) [3]
  • Alexandre Bertrand (CRP Henri Tudor, Luxemburg, Luxemburg) [3]
  • Jonathan Hervieu (CRP Henri Tudor, Luxemburg, Luxemburg) [3]
[3]In the Framework of the energy audit campaign carried out within the project EINSTEIN-II

Translations:

EINSTEIN is available in English and 11 other languages. The translations have been carried out and co-financed / volunteered by:

  • Bulgarian
    Ruse University “Angel Kunchev”, Ruse, Bulgaria
  • Catalan (audit report master document and questionnaire only)
    Francesc Pons Aroztegui, Barcelona, Spain
  • Czech [4]
    ENVIROS s.r.o., Prague, Czech Republic
  • Finnish
    Calefa Oy, Hollola, Finland (Version 3.0)
  • French
    Chamber of Commerce Drôme, Drôme, France Public Research Centre Henri Tudor / Centre de Ressource des Technologies pour l’Environnement, Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg
  • German
    Austrian Energy Agency, Vienna, Austria
  • Italian
    Tecnoalimenti, Milano, Italy
  • Polish [4]
    KAPE, Warsaw, Poland
  • Slovak
    Slovakian Cleaner Production Center, Bratislava, Slovakia
  • Slovene [4]
    Steng - National Cleaner Production Center, Maribor, Slovenia
  • Spanish
    City of Sabadell, Sabadell (Barcelona), Spain (Version 1.1) Chamber of Commerce and Industry Madrid, Spain (Update to Version 2.0-2.2)
[4]Partial translations from version 1.1.

Other contributions:

Thanks to all partners of the European projects EINSTEIN-I and EINSTEIN-II (www.einstein-energy.net), for their ideas and suggestions, critical review, testing, the promotion of the software and the organization of the training workshops.

Thanks furthermore to the approx. 500 energy auditors that have been trained on and worked with EINSTEIN from October 2008 to July 2009 within the EINSTEIN-I project and from March 2011 to June 2012 within the EINSTEIN-II project, and to the other’s from the EINSTEIN users community for their comments, ideas, testing and bug-reports.

Special thanks to the following users for valuable comments and suggestions:

  • David March (Exergy Energy LLC., Berkley/New York/Washington D.C., USA) * detailed testing of the user interface for Version 3.0, which helped us solving lots of little bugs
  • Uwe Dankert (udEEE Consulting, Haar, Germany): * detailed comments and suggestions for the EINSTEIN user interface (some of them already included in V2.2) * detailed testing of time schedules in combination with heat recovery calculations
  • Stephan Mücke (Energie- und Solarberatung, Dresden, Germany): * providing contacts and information about fluid property libraries (humid air, steam). Tips could not yet be included, but are on the list.

1.3. Acknowledgements

The EINSTEIN software tool has been developed since 2007 based on a previous internal tool of energyXperts.NET. The development of EINSTEIN has been co-financed in the Framework of the following projects:

  • European project “I-THERM (Industrial Thermal Energy Recovery Conversion and Management)” with the financial support of the European Commission, Horizon 2020 Resarch and Innovation Programme (Contract no: 680599).
  • European project “EINSTEIN-II (expert-system for an intelligent supply of thermal energy in industry and other large-scale applications)” with the financial support of the European Commission, Programme Intelligent Energy Europe (Contract no: IEE/09/702/SI2.558239).
  • “EINSTEIN in Österreich - EINSTEIN Methode zur Energieeffizienzanalyse und zum Einsatz von erneuerbaren Energien für produzierende Betriebe” funded in project 821807 by Österreichische Forschungsförderungsgesellschaft mbH
  • European project “EINSTEIN (e xpert-system for an in telligent s upply of t hermal e nergy in in dustry)” with the financial support of the European Commission, Programme Intelligent Energy Europe (Contract no: EIE/07/210/S12.466708)
  • Generalitat de Catalunya (Spain), Departament d’Educació i Universitats. Grants Beatriu de Pinòs No. 2006 BP-B2 0033 and 2007 BP-B2 00012 (energyXperts.NET).
  • Spanish Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Commerce (MiTyC). Project No. DEX-590000-2008-84 (energyXperts.NET)

1.4. Third party licenses

EINSTEIN is built on several third-party software packages. The following licenses apply:

1.4.1. SciPy Package:

EINSTEIN plus (V2.5 and later) includes some modules of the SciPy package: https://www.scipy.org/

Copyright (c) 2001, 2002 Enthought, Inc. All rights reserved.

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