Improving Activated Sludge Wastewater Treatment Process Efficiency Using Predictive Control

Authors

  • Ioana Nascu Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering, Texas A&M, USA
  • Ioan Nascu Technical University of Cluj-Napoca Automation Department Str. C.Daicoviciu 15, 3400 Cluj-Napoca, Romania

Keywords:

predictive control, process optimization, process model, wastewater treatment plant, activated sludge treatment

Abstract

This paper investigates the performance of a new predictive control approach used to improve the energy efficiency and effluent quality of a conventional Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP). A modified variant of the well-known Generalized Predictive Control (GPC) method has been applied to control the dissolved oxygen concentration in the aerobic bioreactor of a WWTP. The quadratic cost function was modified to a positional implementation that considers control signal weighting and not its increments, in order to minimize the control energy. The Activated Sludge Process (ASP) optimization using the proposed variant of the GPC algorithm provides an improved aeration system efficiency to reduce energy costs. The control strategy is investigated and evaluated by performing simulations and analyzing the results. Both the set point tracking and the regulatory performances have been tested. Moreover, the effects of some tuning parameters are also investigated. The results show that this control strategy can be efficiently used for dissolved oxygen control in WWTP.

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Published

2018-02-20

How to Cite

[1]
I. Nascu and I. Nascu, “Improving Activated Sludge Wastewater Treatment Process Efficiency Using Predictive Control”, Adv. technol. innov., vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 59–69, Feb. 2018.

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Articles