MIMO robust predictive control applied to a three tanks system

This paper provides an application of linear and nonlinear multivariable robust predictive control to a three tanks system. The design of the nonlinear solution is based on a Multi-Input Multi-Output Nonlinear Auto Regressive with eXogenous outputs (MIMO-NARX) model and the linear controller considers a MIMO Controlled Auto Regressive Integrated Moving Average (MIMO-CARIMA) model. Polytopic uncertainties and structured uncertainties are adopted in order to take into account the uncertain physical dynamics of the system. Using worst case strategy, the control law is obtained by the resolution of a min-max optimization problem. However, the performance criterion to be optimized is non-convex. A genetic algorithm is adopted to solve the control problem. The efficiency of the developed strategies is illustrated on a three tanks system.