Analysis and control of a benchmark boiler

Nonlinear control is a prevalent subject for control engineers, but whether or not a nonlinear controller must be used for a nonlinear system should be considered before attempting. In this paper, gap metric is used to tackle this issue for a benchmark boiler. It is shown that the boiler shows severe nonlinearity, but the nonlinearity can be avoided by careful choice of the operating range. A single linear controller can be designed to work in such an operating range. Simulation results are given to verify the conclusions.