Application of an optimisation and parameter estimation algorithm to a process control plant. Simulation and on-line results

An industrial process can be regarded as a collection of interconnected subprocesses, and its control problem as a collection of interlinked subproblems of manageable size. Each subprocess has its own local regulatory and optimising decision units, and co-ordination is performed at a supremal level to ensure that overall system objectives and constraints are satisfied. Optimisation of the decomposed system is performed in a two-level structure consisting of the coordinator unit and local optimisation decision units, one of each subprocess. The authors outline the ISOPE (integrated system optimisation and parameter estimation) algorithm which is based on the above optimisation principle. Its performance is evaluated under simulation and on-line application, to a laboratory pilot scale vaporiser system