PI Control Best
PI Control Best
a r t i c l e in fo abstract
Article history: An analytical design method for a simple proportional-integral (PI) controller is developed for the
Received 31 October 2007 optimal control of a constrained inventory loop. The proposed method explicitly deals with the
Accepted 21 April 2008 important constraints in the inventory loop, such as the maximum allowable rate of change in the
Available online 10 June 2008
manipulated variable, the maximum allowable decay ratio and damping coefficient in the output
Keywords: response, as well as minimizing the optimal control specification. The simple and explicit form of the
Inventory control resulting tuning rule is clearly advantageous to practitioners.
PI (proportional-integral) controller tuning & 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Optimal control
Constraint control
Liquid level control
1. Introduction action for large errors and slow action for small errors in the liquid
level loops. MacDonald, McAvoy, and Tits (1986) proposed an
Inventory control loops are commonly encountered in the interesting method of deriving an averaging level control algorithm
process industry. Typical examples include accumulator and to minimize the maximum rate of change of the manipulated flow.
bottom level control in a distillation column and the inventory In practice, the operation of an inventory control system should
control of a tank (Yang, Seborg, & Mellichamp, 1994). Inventory be located somewhere between the two extreme situations: the
control is extremely important for the successful operation of first, referred to as tight inventory control, is where the level is very
most chemical plants, because it is through the proper control of important but any variation in the manipulated flow is not of great
the flows and levels that the desired production rates and importance; the second, referred to as averaging inventory control,
inventories are achieved (Marlin, 1995). occurs when some variation in the level is acceptable as long as the
Many studies have been conducted in an attempt to enhance the value remains within specified limits, but the manipulated flow
control performance of the inventory loop. Cheung and Luyben (1979) should not experience rapid variations of a significant magnitude.
studied the liquid level control system with P-only and PI feedback Thus, the control objective of inventory loops should consider
controllers. They proposed a procedure with a design chart for the variations not only in the controlled variable but also in the
tuning of a PI controller in response to a step change of the inlet flow manipulated variable. Furthermore, inventory loops often have
rate. However, it is quite complicated to determine the tuning several important constraints associated with both the controlled
parameters of a PI controller. Proportional-lag control (Luyben & and manipulated variables. This feature of the inventory loop often
Buckley, 1977) is a potentially good solution for liquid level control necessitates an optimal control strategy with constraint handling.
systems with feedforward compensation, but such feedforward However, since most inventory loops make use of a simple PI
control schemes (Luyben & Buckley, 1977; Wu, Yu, & Cheung, 2001) controller, constrained optimal control is rarely implemented in the
require an additional measurement which may be unavailable. Rivera, inventory loops. In this study, an analytical design method for PI
Morari, and Skogestad (1986) proposed the P-only controller using the controllers is developed for optimal regulatory control with
internal model control (IMC) principle for the critically damped explicitly handling the major specifications in the inventory loop.
closed-loop response of a liquid level control system. Buckley (1983)
discussed several nonlinear PI controllers to provide fast control
2. Liquid level control dynamics
Corresponding author. Tel.: +82 53 810 2512; fax: +82 53 811 3262. The liquid level control system presented in Fig. 1 is described
E-mail address: [email protected] (M. Lee). by the following differential equation with the nomenclature of
0967-0661/$ - see front matter & 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.conengprac.2008.04.006
ARTICLE IN PRESS
where
A tV
tH ¼ ¼ (7)
KL Kc
and
ðDHÞA
tV ¼ (8)
Q o max
Fig. 1. Schematic representation of a level control loop featuring manipulation of The tuning parameters Kc and tI determine the location
the outlet stream. of the two poles along with the damping factor that is expressed
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Furthermore, using the relation between the decay ratio and the
qF DQ i 2 3 1o DQ i 2 1 damping coefficient in the second-order process, the constraint
¼ 4o tH z 0 3
¼0 (14)
qz ADH 4 Q o max tH z imposed by (11-3) can be converted to the following inequality
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Table 1
Global optimums of (x,tH) for the constrained case
A (tHyXtH min and zmaxXzyXzmin) At the extremum (zy tHy) (zy tHy)
B (tHyotH min and zmaxXz*Xzmin) or (zy4zmax and tH**otH min) On the constraint tH ¼ tH min (z*,tH min)
C (zy4zmin and tH*XtH min) On the constraint z ¼ zmin (zmin,tH*)
D (zy4zmax and tH**XtH min) or (tHyotH min and z*4zmax) On the constraint z ¼ zmax (zmax,tH**)
E (tHyotH min and z*ozmin) or (zyozmin and tH*otH min) On the vertex by tH ¼ tH min and z ¼ zmin (zmin,tH min)
CASE A
ζ = ζmin ζ = ζmax
τH
optimum
τH = τHmin
CASE B CASE C
ζ = ζmin ζ = ζmax ζ = ζmin
τH
τH
optimum τH = τHmin
optimum
τH = τHmin
ζ ζ
CASE D CASE E
ζ = ζmax ζ = ζmin
optimum τH = τHmin
τH
τH
τH = τHmin
optimum
ζ ζ
Fig. 2. Possible cases of a global optimum location: the shaded region denotes a feasible region.
ARTICLE IN PRESS
topt
I ¼ 4ðzopt Þ2 topt
H (27) method. In order to provide a fair comparison, the closed loop
time constant in the IMC-PI method is adjusted so that both
controllers yield the same maximum peak level. As shown in
4. Illustrative examples Fig. 4, the PI controller using the proposed method gives a smaller
maximum rate of change of the outlet flow, as well as a faster
settling time in the level response. The value of the performance
Consider a liquid level system as follows: the liquid level of a
measure in (11-1) was also evaluated for each method, and the
tank with a cross-section area of 1 m2 and a working volume
proposed PI controller gave a smaller value of 0.2988 than that
(ADH) of 2 m3 is controlled by a PI controller. The maximum outlet
given by the IMC-PI tuning method of 0.3580.
flow (Qomax) is 4 m3/min. The initial steady-state level is 50% and
the nominal flow rates of the inlet and outlet are both 1 m3/min.
The maximum expected change in the inlet flow (DQi) is 1 m3/min. Example 2. Optimal tuning: constrained case.
The maximum allowable rate of change of the outlet flow (Q0 omax)
is 1.5 m3/min2. When the control specifications given by (11-2)–(11-4) have to
Example 1. Optimal tuning: unconstrained case. be strictly satisfied, the optimal tuning values can be obtained by
categorizing the global optimum case from Table 1. Suppose that
Suppose that there is no hard control specification. Optimal the weighting factor is set to o ¼ 0.8 for the liquid level system
tuning can then bepcalculated
ffiffiffi based
pffiffiffion (16) and (17). For example, above. As an illustrative example, consider cases I, II, and III,
if o ¼ 0.5, tyH ¼ 1= 3 and zy ¼ 1= 2 are obtained. The optimal
pffiffiffi PI where the maximum allowable decay ratios are 0.0005, 0.1, and
parameters
pffiffiffi are calculated using (26) and (27) as K c ¼ 3 =2 and 0.1 and the maximum allowable damping coefficients are 1.0, 1.0,
tI ¼ 2= 3 min. and 0.4, respectively, while the maximum allowable rate of
The responses in the level and outlet flow rate for the proposed change of the outlet flow is 1.5 m3/min2 in all three cases. From
optimal tuning with various weighting factors are shown in Fig. 3. (21), tH min ¼ 0:6667 is obtained. The minimum allowable damp-
In the simulation, a step change of 1 m3/min in the inlet flow rate ing coefficients corresponding to the maximum decay ratios,
is introduced at 5 min and sequentially the level set-point calculated using (22), are 0.7708 for case I and 0.3441 for cases II
undergoes a 25% step increase at 20 min. As seen in the figure, and III. Therefore, cases I, II, and III correspond to cases E, B, and D
the lower the weighting factor, o, the more slowly the outlet flow in Table 1 and Fig. 2, respectively. The optimal PI parameters for
changes, but the higher the peak level becomes and the more the three cases are Kc ¼ 0.75, 0.75, and 0.5697 and tI ¼ 1.584, 1.0,
sluggishly the level is controlled. As o is increased, a smaller peak and 0.562, respectively.
can be obtained at the cost of a higher rate of change in the outlet Fig. 5 compares the responses for the level and rate of change
flow rate. In this manner, a clear tradeoff can be achieved between of the outlet flow for the three cases. In the simulation, a step
the tightness in the level control and the smoothness in the outlet change of 1 m3/min in the inlet flow rate is introduced at 1 min.
flow change with only the single tuning parameter, o. The global optimum is located at the vertex point by the two
To confirm the advantage of the proposed method, the closed constraints z ¼ zmin and tH ¼ tH min for case I, on the constraint
loop performance provided by the proposed PI controller is tH ¼ tH min for case II, and on the constraint z ¼ zmax for case III. As
compared with that afforded by the IMC-PI tuning method (Rivera seen in the figure, all of the responses strictly satisfy the given
et al., 1986). The weighting factor o is set to 0.5 in the proposed control specifications.
100
90
80
Level (%)
70
w = 0.2
60 w = 0.5
50 w = 0.7
w = 0.9
40
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Time (min)
1.4
Outlet flow rate (m3/min)
1.2
1
0.8
0.6 w = 0.2
0.4 w = 0.5
w = 0.7
0.2 w = 0.9
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Time (min)
Fig. 3. Level and outlet flow responses using the proposed PI controller (unconstrained case).
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80
proposed
70 IMC-PI
Level (%)
60
50
40
0 5 10 15 20 25
Time (min)
1.5
proposed
dQo/dt (m3/min2)
1 IMC-PI
0.5
-0.5
0 5 10 15 20 25
Time (min)
Fig. 4. Comparison of responses by the proposed method and the IMC-PI tuning method (unconstrained case, w ¼ 0.5).
80
case I
70 case II
Level (%)
case III
60
50
40
0 5 10 15
Time (min)
2
case I
dQo/dt (m3/min2)
1.5 case II
1 case III
0.5
-0.5
0 5 10 15
Time (min)
Fig. 5. Level and rate of change of outlet flow responses using the proposed PI controller (constrained case): case I (DRmax ¼ 0.0005, zmax ¼ 1.0), case II (DRmax ¼ 0.1,
zmax ¼ 1.0), case III (DRmax ¼ 0.1, zmax ¼ 0.4).
Example 3. Robustness against modeling error in dead time and figure indicate that the realistic uncertainties in the dead time and
area. area have little effect on the control performance.
From (5) with Qi(s) ¼ DQi/s and Hset(s) ¼ 0, the liquid level
response is obtained as
References
DQ i er1 t er2 t
HðtÞ ¼ for r 1 ar 2 (A1)
A r1 r2
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1 Technology, 24(12), 65–68.
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sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi Process Control, 11, 311–319.
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