Self-stabilizing economic model predictive control without pre-calculated steady-state optima: Stability and robustness

We propose a new economic nonlinear model predictive control (eNMPC) formulation that tracks the optimality conditions of the real-time optimization problem rather than any specific steady states. The proposed formulation maintains its nature of optimizing economic performance and assured stability properties with the Lyapunov inequality constraint for the closed-loop control. Under general assumptions, we prove that the proposed controller is asymptotically stable without process disturbances and is input-to-state stable when there is a process disturbance. The proposed eNMPC is demonstrated on two case studies and compared against setpoint-tracking NMPC with setpoints determined by the steady-state real-time optimizer to show improved dynamic performance. We also highlight the capability of self-stabilization of the new eNMPC with parameter updates in the process model.

Automated summary

We propose a new economic nonlinear model predictive control (eNMPC) formulation that tracks the optimality conditions of the real-time optimization problem rather than any specific steady states. The proposed formulation maintains its nature of optimizing economic performance and assured stability properties with the Lyapunov inequality constraint for the closed-loop control. Under general assumptions, we prove that the proposed controller is asymptotically stable without process disturbances and is input-to-state stable when there is a process disturbance. The proposed eNMPC is demonstrated on two case studies and compared against setpoint-tracking NMPC with setpoints determined by the steady-state real-time optimizer to show improved dynamic performance. We also highlight the capability of self-stabilization of the new eNMPC with parameter updates in the process model.