NONLINEAR MODEL-BASED STARTUP AND OPERATION CONTROL OF A DISTILLATION COLUMN - AN EXPERIMENTAL-STUDY

A nonlinear model-based control law has been derived within the globally; linearizing control structure in a differential geometric setting, and it has been applied for the startup and operation control of a pilot plant distillation column. The control algorithm is computationally inexpensive and has been implemented by using a personal computer via the RS232C standard interface. Experimental results confirm that the proposed algorithm allows fast column startup as well as effective disturbance rejection and servo operation without the need of further controller tuning when switching from startup control to operation control. The superior performance of the proposed control algorithm over a conventional linear controller has been experimentally shown to result from the presence of the model term in the control law.