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Proceedings of the American Control Conference San Diego, California June 1999

Distillation Column Identification for Control using Wiener Model


Yucai Zhu Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology P.O. Box 513, 5600 MB Eindhoven, The Netherlands Tel. +31.40.2473246 y.zhu@ele. tue.nl Tai-Ji Control, Hageheldlaan 62, 5641 GP Eindhoven, The Netherlands Tel. +31.40.2817192, fax +31.40.2813197, y.zhu@tip.nl
Abstract
Identification of distillation columns for model based control is studied using Wiener type models. A recently developed parametric identification of Wiener model is extended and used to solve the problem. The method provides solutions to the four problems of identification. It is control relevant and can treat both open-loop and closed-loop data. First the identification method is outlined, then two cased studies will be presented, the first one is a simulated high purity distillation column based on first principle models, the second one is a crude unit atmospheric tower. model, Hammerstein model and combined Hammerstein-Wiener model. Many researchers have studied the parametric identification of Hammerstein model. The identification of Wiener models, especially parametric model identification, has received less attention. In parametric estimation of Wiener models, Verhaegen (1998) combines the state space model of the linear part and a parametric nonlinear function, then uses numerical optimization in several steps to estimate model parameters; Wigren (1993) proposed a recursive algorithm where nonlinear function is approximated with a piecewise linear function. Recently, Zhu (1998~) has developed a parametric identification method for SISO Wiener models for control using the so called ASYM method (Zhu, 1998a). In this work, we will extend the identification method for multi-input single-output (MISO) Wiener model and use the method to identify two distillation columns. In Section 2 the notations and problem statement will be given. Parameter estimation, model order selection and model validation are treated in Section 3. In Section 4 two distillation columns will be identified using the developed method. Conclusions are given in Section 5. 2 Problem Statement Given an j-input single-output process. A nonlinear Wiener model of the process in discrete-time is given in Figure 2.1. The input vector u(t) first passes linear time-invariant transfer function vector G(q) and then the output signal w(t) is scaled by the static nonlinear function f(w).It is assumed that: 1) the nonlinear function f(.) is continuous and monotone; 2 ) the output of the linear part is disturbed by a stationary stochastic process { w (t)}.

Keywords: Distillation columns, model based control, identification, Wiener model


1 Introduction

Distillation columns are the single most common processes in refinery and petrochemical industries. Effective control of distillation columns leads to better product quality and production flexibility,lower energy consumption and lower pollution. In the last decade, MPC (model predictive control) technology has been very successful in the control of distillation columns. At present, most industrial MPC controllers use identified linear process models. Because most processes are nonlinear, linear model based control technology can only achieve limited performance. In recent years, nonlinear process identification (for control) has received more attention in both research institutions and in industry. One approach to nonlinear process identification is to use combination of linear dynamic models with static or memoryless nonlinear functions. This kind of models are called block-oriented nonlinear models. There are several advantages when using block oriented models: 1) low cost in identification tests; 2 ) low cost in identification and control computations; 3) it is easy to comprehend and to incorporate a priori process knowledge and 4) they are easy to use in control. Commonly used block-oriented models are Wiener

0-7803-4990-6199$10.80 0 1999 AACC

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The model is given in the following form:

Note that here we have introduced the disturbance v ( t ) before the nonlinear block which is different from the normal assumption that a stationary disturbance acts at the process output. This model implies asymmetrical output disturbance: the output disturbance is large when the process gain is large and is small when the gain is small. This assumption is more realistic from process operation point of view: a larger gain implies that the underlying process is sensitive and hence the disturbance will have strong influence; a small gain means that the process is insensitive and the disturbance will have little influence. Greblicki (1992) uses a similar block diagram for nonparametric identification where the disturbance is assumed to be white noise and independent of input signal, which is more restrictive than our assumption. For parametric model identification, it is necessary to parametrize the model in some way. One of the most powerful and compact parametrization for the linear and disturbance part is the so called Box-Jenkins model: 4 t ) = G ( q ) u ( t )+ H ( q ) e ( t )

the parameters of the model cannot be uniquely determined without introduce further constraint. A solution to this problem is to fix the gain of the nonlinear block. For example one can let am+l = 1. Now, the identzfication problem for the Wiener model can be stated as follows:

Test design. Design an identification test using excitation signals so that the parameters of the model in (2) and (3) are identifiable. If possible, the test should be designed so that the identified model is most suitable for control application. Denote the collected input/output data as
{u(l),Y(t),'LL(2), Y ( 2 ) ,'.' ..'I u(W1 Y(N)J

where N is the number of samples.

Parameter estimation. Determine the parameters of model using the input/output data from the test by minimizing the loss function
N

VPE = x E 2 ( t )

(4)

t=l

where

where B l ( q ) ,...,Bj(q),A(q),C(q)and D(q) a r e p o b o mials of q - l , the unit delay operator, { e ( t ) }is a white noise sequence with zero mean value and variance X2. Note that A(q) is the common denominator of the process transfer functions, u(t)is an j dimensional vector, e ( t ) is a scalar. For simplicity, assume all the transfer functions have equal order 1. We will use cubic splines to model the nonlinear , } block. Let K denote a set of knots { w l ,w2, ..., w which are real numbers and satisfy

Order selection. Determine the orders of the model so that the obtained model is most accurate for control. Model validation. Verify if the identified model is suitable for control. I f not, provide remedy that should includes redesign o,f identification test.
In this definition identification has four fundamental problems. The test design for nonlinear process identification is discussed in Zhu (1998b).

w1=
is given as

W,in

< w2 < w3 < ... < w,

= w,,

A cubic spline function defmed for all real numbers w


m-1

3 Wiener Model Identification


3.1 Parameter Estimation The prediction error defined in (5) is highly nonlinear in model parameters. It is thus desirable to reduce this complexity by looking for some simpler numerical schemes, such as relaxation algorithm often used for Hammerstein model estimation. It is well know that any linear prediction error model structure can be approximated arbitrarily well by a ARX or equation error model with sufficiently high order; see, e.g., Ljung (1987). Based on this fact, let us approximate the linear part of the Wiener model with Box-Jenkins structure in (2) by a high order ARX model

y ( w )=
k=2

ak~w -4

3 fa,

+ am+lw

(3)

where [ ~ 2 , a..., 3 ,a,+1] are fixed real numbers, namely, the parameters to be estimated. Here rn is called the number of knots which can be seen as the "degree" or "order" of the cubic splines. Note that the number of parameters of the cubic splines is also rn. It is easy to verify that the first and the second derivatives of the function are continuous and hence the function is smooth. Note that the signal w ( t ) can not be measured, hence an arbitrary gain may be distributed between the linear block and the nonlinear block. This means that

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where { e ( t ) }is white Gaussian noise with zero mean. Substitute u(t)in (1) using ARX model, take the inverse of the nonlinear function on both sides and then multiply them by An(q). It then follows that

-q(i+l)(d~l@) ... - B,:(i+l,(q)'llj(t))2 (11) 2) Calculate the nonlinear inverse for fixed linear part by minimizing
N

A n ( 4 ) f - ' ( y ( t ) ) = B?(d'lLl(t)+ ... +B:(dum(t) +e@) (7) where n is the order of ARX model which is much higher than the order I of the corresponding BoxJenkins model. The loss function for parameter estimation for model (7) becomes
N
VARX

V t 2 2 ) = E@:+,,
t=l

( 4 ) f & ) (Y( t ) )
(12)

- q ( i + l ) ( q ) u l ( t ) - ... - q ( i + l ) ( q ) ' L l j W 2

Go back to 1). Stop when convergence occurs. Note that both steps in the relaxation algorithm are linear least-squares problems.

=
t=l

(8)

where

4 = A n ( 4 ) f - l ( y ( t ) )- B;(q)ul(t) - ... - q ( q ) u j ( t )
(9) Now let us parametrize the inverse function by a cubic spline function in the similar way as for f(u)
mz-1

Theorem 1 Assume that the input is persistent exciting with order greater than 2n and the number of output signal levels is greater than mp. Then if the relaxation algorithm of (11) and (12) converges, it minimizes the criterion in (8).

'Ykb

k=2

- Y k i 3 + 'Ymz + 'Ymz+lY

where m2 is number of knots and can also be called the degree of the inverse function. Then equation (9) becomes

L k=2 -B;"(q)u1(t) - ... - Bj"(q)uj(t)

J
(10)

Note that the error E ( t ) is linear in the parameters of BP(q), ..., By(q) and bilinear in the parameters of An(q) and f - ' ( y ) . Therefore, one can use the following relaxation algorithm for the estimation of the model. Estimating Nonlinear Inverse and HighOrder ARX Model Initialization.

Method 1. Set A"(q) = 1 and estimate BY(q), ..., By(q) and f - l ( y ) sequentially using linear leastsquares. Method 2. Set f - l ( y ) = y and estimate An(q) and By(q), ..., By(q) using linear least-squares. Iteration. Denote A c , ( q ) , By,(i)(q), ..., B;(i)(q)and f ^ G f ( g ( t ) )as the estimates from iteration i, then 1) c h h h t e the linear P a t for fixed nofinem inverse by minimizing
N

For the proof of the theorem, see Theorem 2.1 of Golub and Pereyra (1973). Calculate the Nonlinear Function from its Inverse The determination of the nonlinear function f(y) from the estimate of its inverse f^-'(y) is an approximation problem. This can be done using a linear leastsquares estimate. The number of knots or degree m of cubic spline function can be determined by visual inspection of the fit of the nonlinear function where process knowledge can be used to help the selection. Note that the process knowledge can also be used to extrapolate the nonlinear function at this step. In general, degree m can be either higher or lower than degree mg. The selection of m 2 is more complicated due to the involvement of the disturbance and will be discussed later. Model Reduction for Linear ARX Model The obtained Wiener model with high order ARX linear part is unbiased, provided that the process can be modelled by a Wiener model, but the variance error of the model is high due to its high order. Model reduction can be used to reduce the variance error. Assume that the nonlinear inverse is known exactly, order n of the ARX model is sufficiently high and the input signal u(t) is sufficiently rich (persistent exciting), then it can be shown (see Ljung, 1985, Zhu, 1989) that the estimated frequency response of the high order model is unbiased and its error follows a Gaussian distribution with variance given as
n cou[Gy(eiu), ..., Gy(eiu),iin(eiw)lT = - + - T ( u ) ~ v ( w ) N (13) where is the frequency response of the estimated high order ARX model, Go(eiw)is that of the true model, n is the order of the ARX model, N is the is the power spectrum number of data points, CDv(u) of output disturbance, @ ( U ) is the power spectrum of

e"(&')

V G ? + & "

= Z { A ? + l ) (q)f^G;
t=1

(Y( t ) )

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input u ( t ) and the white noise { e ( t ) } . Note that this result holds for both open-loop and closed-loop tests. Then based on (13), it can be shown that when N --f 00, the asymptotic negative log-likelihood function for reduced model is given by (Wahlberg, 1989, Zhu and B a c h , 1993):

3.3 Model Validation Here we try to solve the model validation problem for linear part only, by assuming that the nonlinear function is known perfectly. According to the asymptotic theory, the high order ARX model is unbiased, its frequency response follows a Gaussian distribution with variance given by (13). Therefore, a stochastic 3-rr upper bound of the errors can be defined for the high order model

IG2(eiw)- Gg(ei")I 5 & ( w ) (14) where G1(eiw) is the frequency response of the reduced model to be calculated. If disturbance model is needed in cpntrol, it can be obtained by a model reduction on l/A"(q) using the same idea as for the process model.
3.2 Order Selection Four "orders" need to be determined: the order of ARX model n, the number of knots of nonlinear function m, the number of knots of nonlinear inverse m2 and the order of reduced linear model 1. Often the end result is not sensitive to the high order n when it is sufficiently high. The selection of m is easier. The 2 and 1 will be discussed here. selection of m Order Selection for Nonlinear Inverse Here, the degree m2 of nonlinear inverse will be determined during the parameter estimation with high order ARX model. For the purpose of control, the most important requirement is to obtain a model between process input and output. This requires that the simulation error, or, output error of the model should be small. To this end we will propose the following ,final output-error criterion (FOE)

=3

J N

"[@-'(W)]kk@t~(W)

w.p-99.9%

(17)

The same upper bound will also be used for the reduced model G1(eiw), because model reduction will in general reduce the model error. Note that 3-a bound is related to the two test design variables, input spectrum and test time, in a simple fashion. Hence it can be used effectivelyin model validation and test (re)design; see Zhu (1998a, 1998b).
4 Distillation Column Identification
4.1 Identify a High Purity Column The process is a first-principle model of a binary distillation column. The model can capture the main effects important for dynamics and control; see, e.g., Skogestad and Postlethwaite (1996). The inputs of the process are reflux, boilup, the feedforward variable is the feed flow, the outputs are top product purity and bottom product impurity. The data for identification are generated using a noise free closed loop simulation where reflux is used to control the top quality and boilup is used to control the bottom quality. During the simulation, two PRMS (pseudo random multilevel sequence) signals are applied to both setpoints of the top and bottom qualities, a PRMS is applied to feed flow. The average switch time of the test signals 60 minutes. The sampling time is 1 minute. In total 6000 data points are simulated. The first 3000 samples will be used for model identification and the second 3000 samples will be used for model validation. Both linear model using ASYM method (Zhu, 1998a) and Wiener model are identified using the estimation data. The fit errors of the models are shown in the following table where the numbers are the power of output error divided by that of the corresponding output.

N+dvyoe FOE,(m2) = N-d

where V,,, is the output-error (or simulation error) criterion evaluated on the estimation data set and f(.) is the estimated nonlinear function. Here (Akaike's ratio) is used to correct for the overfit and V,,, is used to reflect the model purpose, namely, control. Order Selection for Reduced Linear Model One can of course use*FOE for order selection for the reduced linear model G1(q).When use the criterion for y ( t ) , one gets

Linear model Wiener model

Estimation data 22.28%, 24.46% 18.21%, 19.92%

Validation data 25.05%, 25.39% 20.55%, 19.92%

(16) The effectiveness of FOE has been be tested and compared with FPE in Zhu (199813).

The fit errors of the Wiener model is still large. This is probably caused by too fast test signals which excites much of the dynamic nonlinearity of the column. It is known that the process has a dominant time constant of more than 200 minutes. In this case it is difficult to fit the data using Wiener model which can only model static nonlinearity.

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4.2 Identify a Crude Unit Atmospheric Tower The crude unit atmospheric tower splits the crude in four streams: overhead light product, light gas oil (LGO), heavy gas oil (HGO) and residue as bottom product. A linear model identification has been performed for MPC control. PRBS (pseudo random binary sequence) signals were used as test signals. The sampling time is 1 minute. The average switch time of the test signals are 50 minutes. The flash temperature difference is a controlled variable which is closely related to HGO color. The delta temperature fit error of the linear model is greater than the errors of other product qualities. Here we will study if model fit can be improved using a Wiener model. There are two data sets, an estimation set with 1450 samples and a validation set of 1300 samples. A linear model and a Wiener model are identified. The fit errors of the models are shown in the following table. The model fit are also plotted in Figure 4.1. Linear model Wiener model
2,

method is used to identify two distillation columns. When comparing to the linear models, better model fit have been achieved using Wiener models. The improvement for the crude unit is greater than the simulated distillation column. Because Wiener models can only represent static nonlinearity, it is recommended that the test signal should not move too fast. Slower test signals represent realistic control situations better than very fast signals. The next step is to study if a Wiener model can improve control performance.

References

[l] Golub, G.H. and V. Pereyra (1973). The differentiation of pseudo-inverse and nonlinear least squares problems whose variavles seperate. SIAM J. Numer. Anal., Vol. 10, No. 2, pp 413-432.
[2] Greblicki, W. (1992). Nonparametric identification of Wiener systems. IEEE %ns. Infomation Theory, Vol. 38, NO. 5, pp. 1487-1493. [3] Ljung, L. (1985). Asymptotic variance expressions for identified black-box transfer function models. IEEE Trans. Autom. Control, Vol. AC-30, pp. 834-844. [4] Pajunen, G. (1992). Adaptive control of Wiener type nonlinear systems. Automatica. Vol. 28, No. 4, pp. 781-785. [5] Verhaegen, M. (1998). Identification of the temperature-product quality relationship in a multicomponent destillation column. Chemical EngineeP-ing Communications, Vol. 163, pp. 111-132 [6] Wahlberg, B. (1989). Model reduction of highorder estimated models: the asymptotic ML approach. Int. J. Control, Vol. 49, No. 1, pp. 169-192. [7] Wigren, T. (1993). Recursive prediction error identification using the nonlinear Wiener model. Automatica, Vol. 29, No. 4, pp. 1011-1025.

Estimation data 8.64% 5.08%

Validation data 31.60% 17.73%

F i b of the Wiener model and of the linear modal


1

Solid line: measured wtput


Dashed line: Wiener model output

It
0.5 0-

Donedline: Linear model output

I\ -I

-0.5
-1

-1.5

2 . L

600

800

1000 12M) Samples

14M)

1600

I 1800

Figure 4.1 Measured and simulated delta temperature using Wiener model and linear model, validation data One can see that Wiener model fit is considerably better than that of the linear model. The result is better than that of the high purity column. This partly confirms our explanation that the test signals are too fast for the high purity column. The test signal switch times are similar for the two processes, but the time constant of the crude tower is only about 1/5 of that of the high purity column.
5 Conclusions

[8] Zhu, Y.C. (1998a). Multivariable process identification for MPC: the asymptotic method and its applications. Journal of Process Control, Vol.8, No. 2, pp. 101-115. [9] Zhu, Y.C. (1998b). Identification of Hammerstein models for control using ASYM. Submitted to Int. J. Control.
[lo] Zhu, Y.C. (1998~).Parametric Wiener model identification for control. To be presented at IFAC Congress, July 59, 1999, Beijing.

Identification of MIS0 Wiener model is studied. The so called ASYM method is extended that provides systematic solutions to the four problems of identification for both open-loop and closed-loop tests. The

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