Analysis and Control of a Boiling Water Reactor Model

The Boiling Water Reactor (BWR) problem is a highly nonlinear physical system, and one must understand the dynamics in order to effectively control it. In this research, bifurcation analysis and multiobjective nonlinear model predictive control are performed on a boiling water reactor model. Bifurcation analysis is a powerful mathematical tool used to deal with the nonlinear dynamics of any process. Several factors must be considered, and multiple objectives must be met simultaneously. The MATLAB program MATCONT was used to perform the bifurcation analysis. The MNLMPC calculations were performed using the optimization language PYOMO in conjunction with the state-of-the-art global optimization solvers IPOPT and BARON. The bifurcation analysis revealed the existence of Hopf bifurcations. The Hopf bifurcations, which cause unwanted limit cycles, are eliminated with the use of the tanh functions. The MNLMPC calculations converge to the best possible solution, which is referred to as the Utopia point.