The Journal of Adaptive Control and Signal Processing (IJACSP) has published a special edition for October 2012 dedicated to Industrial Optimised Adaptive Control. This edition presents the “state of the art” of a group of techniques called “Optimised Adaptive Control” currently used in industry and which combines the Theory of Adaptive Systems with Optimised Control. Optimised Adaptive control has its origin in the Introduction to Adaptive Predictive Control in 1976 produced by Juan M. Martín Sánchez, Professor at the UNED (Open University of Spain), current president of ADEX S.L. and Invited Editor for this special edition.
This edition of the IJACSP outlines the use of optimised adaptive controllers combined with suitable control strategies for resolving the dynamic stabilisation problem of an industrial process and driving it towards the performance to be expected from optimised control, overcoming, thereby, the limitations found in previous industrial control systems. It includes an introductory article together with a further five describing applications using this control technology which currently optimise industrial process performance in various areas such as Energy; (combined cycle plant, and coal fired power plant) Water; (water levels in a large canal), Petrochemical; (sulphur recovery process in a refinery) and finally Environmental; (waste water treatment plant).
The introductory article presents an overview of optimised adaptive control methodologies in which the most common design methods from both a stability and optimisation perspectives are interpreted intuitively. In addition, a compilation of industrial applications are presented from both these perspectives, providing examples of industrial products aimed at the application of optimised adaptive control.