Power-level regulation of the MHTGR based upon iterative damping assignment

Because of its strong inherent safety features and the high outlet temperature, the modular high temperature gas- cooled nuclear reactor (MHTGR) has already been seen as the central part for the next generation of nuclear plants. Such power plants are being considered for industrial applications with a wide range of power levels, and thus power-level regulation is an important for the efficient and stable operation. Stimulated by the high regulation performance given by nonlinear controllers, a novel dynamic output-feedback nonlinear power-level regulator is presented in this paper based on iterative damping assignment (IDA). This controller can provide the L₂ disturbance attenuation performance under modeling uncertainty or exterior disturbance, and can guarantee the globally asymptotic closed-loop stability without uncertainty and disturbance. This newly-built control is then applied to the power-level regulation of the HTR-PM plant, and numerical simulation results show the feasibility and high performance of this control strategy. Moreover, the relationship between the control parameters and the regulation performance is not only illustrated numerically but also analyzed theoretically.