Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA) is a cyclic separation process, more advantageous over other separation options for middle scale processes. Automated tools for the design of PSA
processes would be beneficial for the development of the technology, but their development is
a difficult task due to the complexity of the simulation of PSA cycles and the computational
effort needed to detect the performance at cyclic steady state.
We present a preliminary investigation of the performance of a custom multi-objective genetic
algorithm (MOGA) for the optimisation of a fast cycle PSA operation, the separation of
air for N2 production. The simulation requires a detailed diffusion model, which involves coupled
nonlinear partial differential and algebraic equations (PDAEs). The efficiency of MOGA
to handle this complex problem has been assessed by comparison with direct search methods.
An analysis of the effect of MOGA parameters on the performance is also presented
