This article presents the concept of boundary-based predictive controller (BBPC) as an effective tool to control industrial processes with on- - off actuator, for which the control goal is defined to keep the process output within the desired range. An example use of BBPC is shown in application to control of dissolved oxygen (DO) concentration in the laboratory activated sludge setup with biological reactor. It is suggested how to identify dynamical parameters of the proposed DO concentration model and how to provide adaptability required to ensure desired control performance in the presence of significant changes of process load disturbance. Practical implementation in programmable logic controller in the form of a general purpose library function block is also presented. Experimental comparison with conventional on – off controller shows robustness and superiority of the proposed BBPC.

For the efficient control of industrial heat sources, adaptation to significant changes in operating conditions and in heat demand variations are the critical issues. This article presents the concept of the adaptive dynamic matrix controller dedicated to control of heat sources operated as a part of heat distribution systems. The adaptation is based on interpolation of the process nonlinearities. The implementation in programmable logic controller in the form of a general purpose function block is presented and practical issues of the minimization of the memory load and computational complexity are addressed. The suggested concept is experimentally validated by both virtual and real commissioning in the industrial conditions. The aspect of energy efficiency of the heat source control systems is also discussed and for assessment of the energy supply performance, the energy error index is proposed. In terms of this index, the results show superiority of the suggested controller over the conventional approaches.