Optimal feed-water level control for steam generator in nuclear power plant based on meta-heuristic optimization

Optimal control systems are crucial requirement that emphasize the safe operation of pressurized water reactor (PWR) nuclear power plants. The present study focuses on steam generator (SG) feedwater control as being one of the main PWR equipment that is affected directly by grid load transients. Therefore, recent nature inspired meta-heuristic optimization algorithms are applied on SG level control in order to achieve better performance of PWR. The integral time absolute error in SG water level is forming the cost function to be minimized within the necessary constraints. The decision variables are the gains of two principle PI controllers. The complete dynamic model of the system is simulated using Simulink/Matlab. The effectiveness of the proposed controllers is validated and proved by examining the dynamic performance of the plant under sudden load transients compared with other controllers found in literature. Cropped results demonstrated that controllers' parameters with the proposed algorithms provide better control capabilities compared with other methods.