On-line batch process monitoring using a consecutively updated multiway principal component analysis model

Batch processes lie at the heart of many industries; hence the effective monitoring and control of batch processes is crucial to the production of high-quality materials. Multiway principal component analysis (MPCA) has been widely used for batch monitoring and has proved to be an effective method for monitoring many industrial batch processes. However, because MPCA is a fixed-model monitoring technique, it gives false alarms when it is used to monitor real processes whose normal operation involves slow changes. in this paper, we propose a simple on-line batch monitoring method that uses a consecutively updated MPCA model. The key to the proposed approach is that whenever a batch successfully remains within the bounds of normal operation, its batch data are added to the historical database of normal data and a new MPCA model is developed based on the revised database. The proposed method was applied to monitoring fed-batch penicillin production, and the results were compared with those obtained using conventional MPCA. The simulation results clearly show that the ability of the proposed method to adapt to new normal operating conditions eliminates the many false alarms generated by the fixed model and provides a reliable monitoring chart. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.