Glass furnace, simplified modelling for control and real time simulation

Glass furnace is an intensive energy consuming industrial process, and the efforts made to optimise its operation are great. Currently, in many countries over the world, the most important challenge for glass industrials is to meet at low cost the more and more severe environmental constraints on pollutants emissions. Control of combustion and better furnace operation are two fields where much can be gained. The need of rapid models for control algorithms and real time simulation is therefore important. Already good results have been obtained by using the zonal approach for the combustion chamber. We present here the application of this method to the whole furnace, aimed at obtaining a rapid model for the global plant.