Industrial experience of process identification and set-point decision algorithm in a full-scale treatment plant

This paper presents industrial experience of process identification, monitoring, and control in a full-scale wastewater treatment plant. The objectives of this study were (1) to apply and compare different process-identification methods of proportional-integral-derivative (PID) autotuning for stable dissolved oxygen (DO) control, (2) to implement a process monitoring method that estimates the respiration rate simultaneously during the process-identification step, and (3) to propose a simple set-point decision algorithm for determining the appropriate set point of the DO controller for optimal operation of the aeration basin. The proposed method was evaluated in the industrial wastewater treatment facility of an iron- and steel-making plant. Among the process-identification methods, the control signal of the controller's set-point change was best for identifying low-frequency information and enhancing the robustness to low-frequency disturbances. Combined automatic control and set-point decision method reduced the total electricity consumption by 5% and the electricity cost by 15% compared to the fixed gain PID controller, when considering only the surface aerators. Moreover, as a result of improved control performance, the fluctuation of effluent quality decreased and overall effluent water quality was better.