Multi-objective PID Controller Tuning for an Industrial Gasifier

Control of industrial plants is an important engineering field of study, where the optimization of such processes can lead to better product quality and higher profit. The present work deals with the optimization of an industrial gasifier, proposed as a benchmark challenge by ALSTOM Power Technologies in 2002. Researchers from around the globe proposed different methods for optimizing such system, using linear and nonlinear system identification techniques, different controller schemes, such as proportional-integral-derivative and model predictive controllers, and search methods for controller tuning. The authors care for the study of a methodology that can generalize the controller optimization process of real industrial systems, where linear system identification can lead to simpler systems, which are used to design more robust controllers. The proposed work deals with linear system identification and multi-objective optimization for the gasifier's controller design. To do so, the authors divide the problem in two steps, the linear system identification, where step functions are fed to the gasifier in order to detect the output response of the system, and the design of a proportional-integral-derivative controller, where spherical pruned multi-objective differential evolution algorithm is used in order to optimize the controller gains. The proposed method, unfortunately, does not provide an optimal controller, which can be explained by the complexity of the benchmark system. With such results, the authors believe a better multi-objective problem definition is necessary. Also, it is concluded that such benchmark presents a real challenge for future controller design methodologies.