Wiener-Neural-Network-Based Modeling and Validation of Generalized Predictive Control on a Laboratory-Scale Batch Reactor

Batch reactors are large vessels in which chemical reactions take place. They are mostly found to be used in process control industries for processes such as reactant mixing, waste treatment of leather byproducts, and liquid extraction. Modeling and controlling of these systems are complex due to their highly nonlinear nature. The Wiener neural network (WNN) is employed in this work to predict and track the temperature profile of a batch reactor successfully. WNN is different from artificial neural networks in various aspects, mainly its structure. The brief methodology that was deployed to complete this work consisted of two parts. The first part is modeling the WNN-based batch reactor using the provided input-output data set. The input is feed given to the reactor, and the reactor temperature needs to be maintained in line with the optimal profile. The objective in this part is to train the neural network to efficiently track the nonlinear temperature profile that is provided from the data set. The second part is designing a generalized predictive controller (GPC) using the data obtained from modeling the reactor to successfully track any arbitrary temperature profile. Therefore, this work presents the experimental modeling of a batch reactor and validation of a WNN-based GPC for temperature profile tracking.