Hardware Implementation of An LQR Controller of A Drum-Type Boiler Turbine on FPGA

In a steam power generator, boilers produce steam uninterruptedly in large amounts. The drum boiler system is extremely nonlinear with multi-variable parameters rendering it a very difficult process control problem. The boiler is also inherently unstable due to the effect of the dynamic shrink/swell phenomenon in the drum. Drum boiler systems have been controlled by Single-Input, Single-Output (SISO) Proportional-Integral-Differential (PID) controllers. Such SISO control systems do not take into consideration the interaction between the controlled variables or the effect of demanding load change on boiler dynamics. In this work, we present a hardware-based multi-variable Linear Quadratic Regulator (LQR) controller of the boiler-turbine system. Reconfigurable hardware has been recently used to implement a number of complex control systems due to the performance and flexibility gains of such platforms. The proposed controller is implemented and validated on a Xilinx Artix-7 FPGA AC701 Evaluation Kit. Testing results depict a significant improvement in the control system characteristics compared to the classical PID control techniques.