ROBUST MULTIVARIABLE CONTROL OF A BINARY DISTILLATION COLUMN

Davison's robust, multivariable, feedback-feedforward controller is applied to the control of a pilot-scale Binary Distillation Column, as a Master Loop in a cascaded configuration. The inner or Slave Loop consists of the original Plant with Multiloop Proportional Control. This cascaded configuration is shown to have a number of advantages for practical implementation. The performance of the controller is evaluated by experimental application to a computer-controlled distillation column. The robust controller gives improved control performance compared to that achieved using conventional multiloop proportional plus integral plus derivative (PID) control.