Developments in furnace control for improved efficiency and reduced emissions

This paper describes an on-going research programme which is being undertaken by the Control Theory and Applications Centre of Coventry University into developing novel approaches for improved control of a high temperature industrial plant. The motivation for such research has arisen from the need to develop control algorithms which result in tighter control of industrial plants in terms of energy usage whilst at the same time reduce the emission of harmful pollutants to the atmosphere. The approach makes use of a bilinear self-tuning control strategy that has been developed application specific for gas-fired industrial furnace applications. This paper presents the results of modelling and simulation studies together with some preliminary results involving closed loop control when the bilinear approach is applied to a multi-zone multi-burner furnace model