Introduction  In traditional design engineering, there are two trends in the design and selection of auxiliary equipment of heat engine. One is to put function first and ignore cost; the other is to take low cost as the criterion and ignore the importance of some functions. Both of these two selection methods have certain defects, and the function and cost cannot be considered as a whole to maximize the benefits. With the development of the industry, an increasing emphasis is placed on the cost performance in the process of heat engine equipment selection in design engineering so as to achieve the best function at a reasonable cost.

  Method  In this paper, the theory of value engineering was applied to the design and selection of heat engine equipment, and the function and cost were considered in a unified manner through the formula of value coefficient, so as to realize the optimal heat engine equipment selection scheme.

  Result  Combined with practical cases, this paper has demonstrated the feasibility of applying the theory of value engineering to the selection of heat engine equipment.

  Conclusion  The paper provides a feasible method for realizing the unified demonstration of equipment function and cost in the heat engine equipment selection process of the subsequent power plant design.