A Framework for Adaptive Predictive Control System Based on Zone Control

In view of the degradation of predictive control performance caused by model mismatch, a multi-variable adaptive predictive control system framework which is composed of zone model predictive control (MPC), identification module and performance monitoring module, is presented. The proposed framework synthesizes the traditional control mode and the test mode to construct a unified form, which is convenient to implement with the MPC software packages. Traditional setpoint control is switched to zone control to ensure that the process constraints remain satisfied in testing, while multi-variable test signals are introduced to guarantee the sufficient excitation of the plant. In addition, in order to maximize the signal-to-noise ratio, an adaptive method of determining the amplitude of test signals is proposed. All the online open-loop identification methods are suitable for this framework, as the testing is treated as “open-loop,” which solves the problem of the correlation between input signals and noises in the closed-loop identification. These characteristics of the proposed framework are illustrated via a simulation.