Optimal Control of Operation Efficiency of Belt Conveyor

In literature, variable speed control of belt conveyors is recommended to save energy consumption. However, the current implementations mostly focus on lower level control loops without operational considerations at the system level. This paper intends to take a model based optimization approach to improve the operation efficiency of belt conveyors with consideration of various constraints. Specifically, three optimization problems of a typical belt conveyor system are formulated, respectively, with solutions in simulation for a case study.