Proceedingsof the 1998 IEEE

International Conference on Control Applications

Trieste, Italy 1-4 September 1998

FP04

A new PID controller tuning system and its application

to a flue gas temperature control in a gas turbine power plant
Masanori Yukitomo, Yutaka fino, Shiro Hino, Kazuki Takahashi, Kazue Nagata
Toshiba Corporation
4- 1 Ukishima-cho, Kawasaki-ku, Kawasaki (Japan)
Tel: +8 1-44-288-8020
F a : +8 1-44-288-8213
Email: masanori.yukitomo @ toshiba.co.jp
is outlined in section 2, and the results of the tests at the
gas turbine power plant are presented in section 3. The
conclusions are followed in section 4.

Abstract
In this paper, a newly developed PID controller tuning
system is presented. This system has various functions to
tune PID control loops, which include, (1) input signals
generation for system identification, (2) the model transfer
function estimation, (3) PID controller parameters design
using the frequency region model matching method, and
(4) the designed closed-loop system validation (closedloop simulations, analysis of frequency response and so
on). This system was applied to a flue gas temperature
control system in a gas turbine power plant. The results of
the experiments to the actual process showed that this
tuning system was effective in improving controllability
and reducing the time significantly for proper tuning of
control loops.

2. PID Controller Tuning System

In this section, an overview and the algorithm of the

developed PID controller tuning system is presented.
System Overview
The tuning steps used in this system are shown in Fig.1.
The each functions in step 1 through 4 shown in Fig.1
were developed and instaIled on a laptop computer (type
name : SPARC LT AS1000, OS : Solaris 2.4) using C
language. This computer was connected to the plant
control device with GPIB. In this computer, the
monitoring program was installed to collect and display
plant variables, and it was also used for adding
identification signal and collecting plant U 0 data. The
functions are described below briefly.

1. Introduction
A number of PID controllers are used in local control
loops of the thermal power plants. These are turbine
auxiliary controls and boiler controls. In the combinedcycle power plants, for instance, which are now widely
applied due to the advantages of its high efficiency and
low environmental effects, there are more than 100 PID
control loops. It has been noted that a considerable
amount of time is required to tune these PID control loops
because the tuning work is carried out for each PID
controller according to the engineers experience based on
their heuristic knowledge by trial and error. The time
available for tuning is not enough due to the low priority
assigned to loop tuning during the commissioning period,
therefore some of the loops are often remained improperly
and insufficiently tuned. A PID controller tuning system
[ I ] is therefore needed to reduce the time and labor
required for tuning and to improve the performance of a
closed-loop control with the properly tuned control
parameters. We have developed a PID controller tuning
system and have tested it at a gas turbine power plant. In
this paper, the PID controller tuning system and its
experimental test results are presented.

Step 1) system identification and signal processing

In this step, a test signal is added to the plant input or the
reference signal of the target control system. The U 0
signals are recorded-and processed for modeling. In this

Step 1

System identification

Step 2

Modeling ( ARX model )

Step 3

PID parameter design

(model matching method)

Step 4

1
I

Step 5

application

Fig. 1 Flow chart of the PLD tuning system

The tuning algorithm of the PID controller tuning system

0-7803-4104-X/98/$10.00 01998 IEEE

1373

tuning system, a step signal, M sequence signal, and

random signal can be used as the test signal. The system
also has a bias elimination, data decimation and data
filtering functions.

. In this criterion, Q and R are design

criterion J,,,

parameters given by designer.

(1)

JLQ, = lo-[e'(t)Qe(t)+u'(t)Ru(t)Pt

where, e ( t ) = r ( t ) - y ( t ) . r(t), u(t), and y ( t ) are reference

signal, input signal of the plant, and output signal of the
plant, respectively.
PID controllerC(s) can be expressed by the equation

Step 2) modeling
The discrete transfer function model is determined from
the gathered input and output data by using the least
squares method [ 2 ] . The transfer function is modeled as
ARX (auto-regressive exogenous) -type model. This
discrete transfer function model is transformed into the
continuous time transfer function model by zero order
hold method. And
this tuning system has several
functions to evaluate the model, such as the step response,
frequency response of the model, open loop simulation,
and displaying of model transfer function.

(2).
C(s) = f,

where

f,,&

fi
+-+s

fdS

l+z,s

, and f, are proportional gain, integral gain,

and derivative gain, respectively, and z, is a time

constant that is determined from the given parameter. The
open loop transfer function of the LQG controller ( called
the reference model ) can be expressed as
Lm(sj= P(sjCm(sj. The frequency responses of P ( s ) ,

Step 3) PID parameters design

Using this tuning system, it can be designed a PID type
controller as shown in Fig. 2, which has a feed forward
(FF) element from a reference signal A frequency region
model matching method based on loop transfer functions
is used for designing a PID controller parameters, and
partial model matching method is used for designing a FF
parameter. These methods are explained in subsection B
and C.

L,,(s), and C(s) are expressed by the equations shown

below, which contain real and imaginary parts.
P ( j u >= P ' ( W ) + j P ' ( w )
(3)
L,,,(juj = Ll,(w)+ j G , ( @
C ( j @ = [ f ,+ a , ( ~ ) f d l + j [ a 2 ( ~ > f i + o c , ( ~ ) f d l

a,(@=
Step 4) validation of the designed closed-loop system
The performance and stability of the designed closed-loop
system can be validated. The tuning system has various
functions including closed-loop simulations, frequency
response of the loop transfer function, the sensitivity
function and the complementary sensitivity function, and
calculation of the phase and gain margin.

TdU 2

1+ (z,wj2

,a2(u)
= --,a3(@ =
U

I+ (zdu)2

The error E ( j w ) between the reference model and the

loop transfer function with PID controller is written
below.
E ( j u ) = L,(ju)- P(ju)C(jcci)
(4)
The model matching is performed by minimizing the sum
of the squares of E( j u ) at each of the frequency points

Step 5) application
The designed PID parameters are applied to the plant and
the control performance is evaluated.

ui,,~,...ui,,,

, which are obtained by dividing the

frequency band [U,,, U,,] by an integer N , where N

is sufficiently large and the matching minimum and
maximum frequencies are denoted as U,,, and amax.
Thus, J in equation (5) is minimized.

Frequency model matching method [ 3 ],[5]

In this tuning system, the PID controller parameters are
designed by using a LQG controller. The basic principle is
that the loop transfer function with the PID controller is
compared to a reference loop transfer function and PID
parameters are adjusted so that the both control system
transfer function has the same frequency response at some
given frequencies. The reference loop transfer function is
constructed using a LQG controller. This method is based
on model matching in the frequency region, especially,
focusing on the cut-off frequency region. The algorithm is
described below.

J = $ . l L m ( j q )- P ( j q ) C ( j w , ) 1 2

(51

1=1

The real and imaginary parts of E ( j w ) are denoted as

E ' ( u ) , E ' ( u ) , respectively. Equation ( 6 ) is obtained from

equations (3) and (4).

rr

Where, K(w) is given by the following equation.

The transfer function of the plant is described as P(s), and

the transfer function of the LQG controller and PID
controller are denoted as C,,(s) and C(s) , respectively.

K(u)

P ' ( W ) - p'(u)oc,(u)P'(w)a1(w)-P(u)a3(u)

Pi(@
The LQG controller is designed by minimizing the

1374

P'(uja2(ujP ' ( u j a 1 ( w ) +P'(uja,(w)

water

- injected

Using equation (6), equation (5) is transformed into

equation (7).

for deNO

(7)
= (b - Ax)'(b - Ax)

e(Turem(atper

Gas Tubine

Matrix A and vectors b and x in the above equation are

defined below.

Fig. 3 Target System

1
(1 1)
+a,s+ u2s2+...
is a Maclaurin series of derivative term

i ( s )=

U,

If matrix A is not singular, the optimal PID parameter x*

which minimizes the criterion J is given by least squares
method and can be calculated by equation (9).

C,(s)

f,s/(l+zs).
C,(S) =b,s+b2s2+.(12)
Using equation (11) and (12), the equation (10) is
transformed into the equation (13).

x* = (A'A>-~~~b

(9)
In this algorithm, method of determination of the matching
band [uminU,,,] is important. The matching band
should include the cut-off frequency ( gain cross-over and
phase cross-over frequencies ) because the stability of the
closed loop system is evaluated in the cut-off frequency
region.

G,,(s) =

/LIS
1+ (ao+a,s+.*.)s/ f i

(13)

+ (b l s + b 2 s 2 + . . . ) s /f ,+(f, / f , ) s

The matching reference model is denoted below.

G,,f (s) =

1+pos

Design method of Feed Forward (FF) gain [4]

FF gain ( ff ) is designed by using partial model matching

(14)
1+ d + a*(Os)2+.where 4, is a design parameter determining the effect of

method. The closed-loop transfer function with PID

controller, which is a transfer function from the reference
signal to the output signal, is matched to a reference model
as given by equation (14). The algorithm is described
below.

the FF gain, the parameter o and a,(i=1,2;..) are

given by PID parameters.
The FF gain can be designed by comparing parameters
of the equation (13) and (14) from the low order term, and
the designed FF gain is shown below.
ff = B ( a o + f J
(15)

The closed-loop transfer function in Fig. 2 can be

expressed by the equation (10).

3. The Application to a Power Plant

Target System
The control loop to which this tuning system was applied
is shown in Fig.3. The target process is the flue gas
temperature control loop in a 15MW gas turbine power
plant. The main objective of this control is to keep the
temperature of the flue gas under the set value for
protecting the catalyst in the deNOx equipment. This
control system is a cascade-type, which has a flue gas
temperature control loop and a water flow control loop.
The flue gas temperature control loop determines the
required water flow rate according to the temperature error
between the gas temperature and the set value of flue gas
temperature. The objective of the flow control loop is to
regulate the water flow rate to the value determined by the
flue gas temperature control loop, and to follow the set

where i ( s ) is denoted by equation (11).

FF ain

A
Fig. 2 Block diagram of PID control system

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value with minimum time lag.

500

Experimented Conditions
Firstly, the flow control loop was tuned and then the flue
gas temperature control loop was tuned. The conditions in
each tuning are shown below.

-500

I
0

50

100

150

200
250
time [sec]

300

350

400

450

50

100

150

200
250
time [sec]

300

350

400

450

[flow control loop]

(1) System identification : In this step, the set point value,
which was given by the output of the flue gas temperature
control loop, was kept constant. M sequence signal was
then added to the plant input variable. The results of this
experiment are shown in Fig. 4. The values of the PID
parameters for flow control loop used in this test are
shown in Table 1.

Fig 4 System identification result (flow)

(2) Modeling : The model was assumed to be a third order

model without a delay term. The delay time was 2.4
seconds that was estimated from the identification data.
(3) PID design : The LQG controller design parameter ( Q
and R ) and FF design parameter p ,which were chosen in
this test, were shown in Table 2. The designed PID control
loop of case 2 was designed to be the same response as the
original PID control loop (see Table l), the case 1 was
designed to be slower, and case 3 and 4 were designed to
be faster than the original loop response.

' "0

500

1000

1500

1000

1500

time [sec]

: ' i :

50

[flue gas temperature control loop]

(1) System identification : In this step, the PID parameters
of flow control loop were used the previous flow loop
tuning result(see Table2, case 2). A step signal was then
added to the plant input variable. The results of this
experiment are shown in Fig. 5. The PID parameters of the
flow and temperature control loop in this test are
presented in Table 3.

500
time [sec]

Fig. 5 System identification result (temperature)

Table 1 Controller parameters in the flow loop identification
test
r

f p

0.000125

(2) Modeling : The model was assumed to be a fifth order

model without a delay term. The delay time was 18
seconds that was estimated from the identification data.

case 1
case 2
case3
case4

(3) PID design : The design parameter Q, R a n d p ,which

were chosen in this test, were shown in Table 4. The case1
PID control loop was designed to be the same response as
the original PID control loop (see Table 3), and case 2 was
designed to be faster than the original loop response.
Experimental Results
[flow control loop]
The designed controller parameters are shown in Table 5.
The results of the set point change experiment are shown
in Fig. 6 and Fig. 7. In these figures, the upper, middle,
and lower graph show the results of
=0.1, b, =0.3, and

,6=0.5, respectively. Fig. 6 shows the results obtained

using case 2 parameters. From this figure, the performance
of the output response was improved by increasing the

I
I

f,

IO

1.o
1.o
1.o
I .o

0.003
0.012
0.03
0.05

ff
1

I
I

0.1, 0.3, 0.5

0.1, 0.3, 0.5
0.1, 0.3, 0.5
0.1, 0.3, 0.5

fP

fi

.ff

flow loop

0.00012

9.2

3.7

temperature
loop

1.O

30

1.o

0.3

1376

parameter

p.
fP

[flue gas temperature control loop]

The designed controller parameters are shown in Table 6.
And the results against the step disturbance added in the
experiment are shown in Fig. 7. The upper and lower
graph are the results of obtained using case 1 and case 2
controller parameters, respectively. By increasing the Q
parameter, the influence of disturbance was decreased.

fi

.f.f

p=O.l
case 1
case2
case3
case4

I
I
I
I

0.000065
0.00012
0.00018
0.00023

I
I
I
I

I
I
I
I

8.8
9.2
10.0
10.7

1.3
0.75
0.53
0.44

I
I

p=0.3

3.8
2.2
1.6
1.3

p=OS

6.4
3.7
2.6
2.2

Table 6 Desi ned controller arameters (tem erature)

4. Conclusion
case 1
case 2

The PID controller tuning system was applied to the flue

gas temperature control loop in the gas turbine power
plant. Using this tuning system, the PID with 2 degree of
freedom controller parameter could be designed by only
two design parameters Q and
and The experimental
test results showed that the performance of control loop
could be improved by increasing these parameters. Also,
the design time was greatly reduced, thus only one hour
was required to design the controller parameters. It was
proved that the developed PID controller tuning system
was effective and useful in improving controllability and
reducing required time significantly for proper tuning of
control loops.

227.5
307.5

16.5

1.18

30

40
time [secj

50

60

70

80

30

40
time [sec{

50

60

70

80

400

p,

400
2200-

2
0--*

This tuning system is now being tested in other power

plants control loops.

400

5. References

2200 -

[ l ] Y. Iino, T. Shigemasa, Practical Modeling and

Control System Design Methods for CAE System,
Proceedings of the 1984 American Control Conference,
89CH2772-2, pp.1784-1753.
[2] L. Ljung, System Identification - Theory for the User,
Prentice-Hall, 1987.
[3] Y. Chida, T. Shigemasa, Controller Reduction by
Model Matching in Cut-off Frequency Band,
Proceedings of the 34th SICE Annual Conference,
pp.865-866(in Japanese).
[4] T. Shigemasa, A Design Method for feed forward
Servo System based on Reference model with zero,
Proceedings of the 6th Dynamical System Theory
Symposium, pp53-56(in Japanese ).
[ 5 ] M. Yukitomo, Y. Iino, T. Shigemasa, A New PID
tuning method by applying an iterative concept,
Proceedings of the 1 1th IFAC Symposium on System
Identification, pp.613-618.

10

20

10

20

Fig. 6 Set point change experiment ( case 2 )

I

2,

-8

500

1000

J
1500

1000

1500

time [sec]

-U

500

time [sec]

Fig. 7 Step disturbance experiment ( temperature)

1377