The industrial sector is a critical element in the sustainability transition as it is currently the largest
consumer of fossil fuels, and the consumption is forecasted to continue to increase. Approximately
one-fifth of the total industrial primary energy consumption is wasted due to the lack of proven
attractive schemes for effective recovery. When addressing the opportunities of industrial waste
heat recovery (WHR), it is found that the feasibility depends on multiple factors, including the forms
and capacities of the heat sources, the potential heat sinks, and the effectiveness, technological
maturity, and economic impact of available technologies. Developing systematic approaches to
identify optimal WHR options for different applications is key to effectively reduce plant-scale
energy consumption. In particular, power consumption accounts for more than half of the industrial
energy use, and its share is expected to grow with the expansion of electrification aspirations. In
this paper, industrial WHR technologies are investigated, and tools are developed to understand the
sustainability and techno-economic impact of integrating these technologies within industrial
processes. We specifically propose a data-driven technology-agnostic approach to evaluate the use
of heat engines, which can in practice be organic Rankine cycle (ORC) systems, and of thermally-
driven (i.e., absorption) heat pumps in the context of industrial WHR for plant-scale power demand
reduction. The scope of this work explores three pathways to achieving efficiency improvements
in bulk chemicals plants, represented by olefins production facilities, which are: (i) direct onsite
power generation; (ii) enhancement of existing power generation processes; and (iii) reduction in
power consumption by compressor efficiency improvements through waste-heat-driven cooling.
The techno-economic performance of these technologies is assessed, with particular attention to
industrial facilities that reside in hot climates, using fine-tuned technology-agnostic thermodynamic
and market-based costing models. Finally, decision-aiding performance maps are derived by
varying the quantity and the quality of waste-heat sources and heat sinks, offering application-
specific guidelines for selecting appropriate waste-heat recovery schemes. These findings reveal
valuable factors for selecting such integration schemes for various industries and scenarios.