Constrained MPC design for heave disturbance attenuation in offshore drilling systems

This paper presents a constrained model predictive control scheme for regulation of the annular pressure in a well during managed pressure drilling from a floating rig subject to heave motion. The results show that closed-loop simulation without disturbance has a fast regulation response and without any overshoot. The robustness of controller to deal with heave disturbances is investigated. The constrained MPC shows good disturbance rejection capabilities. The simulation results show that this controller has better performance than a PID controller and is also capable of handling constraints of the system with the heave disturbance.