Discussion on Muskingum versus Integrator-Delay Models for Control Objectives

A comparative study about two models, Muskingum and integrator-delay (ID) models, for canal control is presented. The former is a simplified hydrological model which is very simple and extensively used in hydraulic engineering for simulation and prediction. The latter is also a model with physical meaning and is widely used for irrigation canals control. Due to a lack of general awareness of Muskingum prediction model in regulation from the control community, authors present this comparative study with the ID control model. Both models have been studied and analyzed for control purposes. This study has been carried out and validated in a real irrigation canal, at Aghili irrigation district in Iran, using two traditional control approaches, PID with feedback and predictive control. The results demonstrate the advantages and drawbacks of both models, showing the benefits and limitations of using the widespread Muskingum model among the hydraulics scientific community for control design

Modeling and real-time control of urban drainage systems: A review

Urban drainage systems (UDS) may be considered large-scale systems given their large number of associated states and decision actions, making challenging their real-time control (RTC) design. Moreover, the complexity of the dynamics of the UDS makes necessary the development of strategies for the control design. This paper reviews and discusses several techniques and strategies commonly used for the control of UDS. Moreover, the models to describe, simulate, and control the transport of wastewater in UDS are also reviewed.This work has been partially supported by Mexichem, Colombia through the project “Drenaje Urbano y Cambio Climático: Hacia los Sistemas de Alcantarillado del Futuro.” Fase II, with reference No. 548-2012, the scholarships of Colciencias No. 567-2012 and 647-2013, and the project ECOCIS (Ref. DPI2013-48243-C2-1-R).Peer Reviewe

Model predictive control of resonance sensitive irrigation canals

Saving water is an economic and ecological need. One way to save water is to reduce losses in irrigation networks by canal automation. The goal of canal automation is to make the right amount of water to at arrive in the right time. In order to achieve this goal, one of the ways is controlling the gates in the irrigation network by some control algorithm. In this work the control of a specific type of canal pools is studied: short and flat pools that are prone to resonance. The downstream water level control of this type of canals is investigated using the example of the 3-reach laboratory canal of the Technical University of Catalonia. Numerical and experimental studies are carried out to investigate the following: the choice of models for predictive control, the possibility to achieve offset-free control while using gravity offtakes and the best choice of control action variables. The objective of this work is to develop a well performing centralized model predictive controller (MPC) for the laboratory canal that is able to handle known and unknown setpoint changes and disturbances, and also to draw further conclusions about controller design for this type of canals. A recently developed model for resonant canals, the Integrator Resonance, is implemented and successfully tested experimentally for the first time. A new method to achieve offset free control for model predictive control is developed and tested numerically and experimentally. A choice of control variables are tested: As opposed to the discharge which is generally used as the control action variable, a state space model is formulated by using the gate opening as control variable without the need of water level measurement downstream of the gates. The results are summarized and conclusions are presented for control of short and flat canals that are prone to resonance

Modeling and real-time control of urban drainage systems : a review

Urban drainage systems (UDS) may be considered large–scale systems given their large number of associated states and decision actions, making challenging their real–time control (RTC) design. Moreover, the complexity of the dynamics of the UDS makes necessary the development of strategies for the control design. This paper reviews and discusses several techniques and strategies commonly used for the control of UDS. Moreover, the models to describe, simulate, and control the transport of wastewater in UDS are also reviewed.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Real-time Measurement and Control of Urban Stormwater Systems

Urban watersheds are being stressed beyond their capacity as storms are becoming more frequent and intense. Flash flooding is the leading cause of natural disaster deaths in the United States. Simultaneously, population pressures are changing landscapes and impairing water quality by altering the composition of urban stormwater runoff. Presently, the only solution to combat these challenges relies on the construction of larger infrastructure, which is cost prohibitive for most cities and communities. Advances in technology and autonomous systems promise to usher in a new generation of “smart” stormwater systems, which will use city-scale sensing and control to instantly “redesign” themselves in response to changing inputs. By dynamically controlling pumps, valves and gates throughout the entire city this paradigm promises to push the performance of existing assets without requiring the construction of new infrastructure. This will allow for entire urban watersheds to be dynamically controlled to meet a variety of desired outcomes. Despite technological advances and an established fundamental knowledge of water systems, it is presently entirely unclear how “smart” stormwater systems can actually be built. This dissertation conducts a review of existing “static” solutions and provides an assessment of a number of limited, but highly promising, real-world control studies. An analysis of sensor network scalability is then carried out, focusing on how large water sensor networks can be enabled by leveraging wireless connectivity and web-services. A study of urban water quality follows, which shows how real-time data improve our watershed-scale understanding of pollutant loads during storm events. In turn, through an unprecedented real-world study, it is illustrated how this improved understanding can be used to control flows across a watershed. A feedback control-based approach is then introduced to enable the control of urban watersheds. Through extensive simulation, this framework is applied to identify which control assets have the highest potential to improve watershed performance and to determine how many sites must be retrofitted to achieve desired outcomes. Finally, an analysis of input uncertainty is carried out, which quantifies the importance of weather forecasts in improving control performance across the scale of urban headwater catchments. The dissertation closes by laying out future directions in the emerging field of “smart” stormwater research.PHDCivil EngineeringUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/140797/1/bpwong_1.pd

Instrumentation, model identification and control of an experimental irrigation canal

This thesis aims to develop control algorithms for irrigation canals in an experimental framework.These water transport systems are difficult to manage and present low efficiencies in practice. As a result, an important percentage of water is lost, maintenance costs increase and water users follow a rigid irrigation schedule.All these problems can be reduced by automating the operation of irrigation canals.In order to fulfil the objectives, a laboratory canal, called Canal PAC-UPC, was equipped and instrumented in parallel with the development of this thesis. In general, the methods and solutions proposed herein were extensively tested in this canal.In a broader context, three main contributions in different irrigation canal control areas are presented.Focusing on gate-discharge measurements, many submerged-discharge calculation methods are tested and compared using Canal PAC-UPC measurement data. It has been found that most of them present errors around ±10%, but there are notable exceptions. Specifically, using classical formulas with a constant 0.611 contraction value give very good results (errorWith respect to irrigation canal modeling, a detailed procedure to obtain data-driven linear irrigation canal models is successfully developed. These models do not use physical parameters of the system, but are constructed from measurement data. In this case, these models are thought to be used in irrigation canal control issues like controller tuning, internal controller model in predictive controllers or simply as fast and simple simulation platforms. Much effort is employed in obtaining an adequate model structure from the linearized Saint-Venant equations, yielding to a mathematical procedure that verifies the existence of an integrator pole in any type of canal working under any hydraulic condition. Time-domain and frequency-domain results demonstrate the accuracy of the resulting models approximating a canal working around a particular operation condition both in simulation and experiment.Regarding to irrigation canal control, two research lines are exploited. First, a new water level control scheme is proposed as an alternative between decentralized and centralized control. It is called Semi-decentralized scheme and aims to resemble the centralized control performance while maintaining an almost decentralized structure. Second, different water level control schemes based on PI control and Predictive control are studied and compared. The simulation and laboratory results show that the response and performance of this new strategy against offtake discharge changes, are almost identical to the ones of the centralized control, outperforming the other tested schemes based on PI control and on Predictive control. In addition, it is verified that schemes based on Predictive control with good controller models can counteract offtake discharge variations with less level deviations and in almost half the time than PI-based schemes.In addition to these three main contributions, many other smaller developments, minor results and practical recommendations for irrigation canal automation are presented throughout this thesis

Hybrid modelling and receding horizon control of combined sewer networks

Combined sewer networks carry wastewater and storm water together. During normal operation all the water is delivered to wastewater treatment plants, where it is treated before being released to surrounding natural water bodies. However, during heavy rain events, the network capacity may become insufficient leading to untreated water discharges to the receiving environments. To mitigate these undesired effects, combined sewer networks are usually provided with detention tanks and flow redirection elements, managed to fully take advantage of the network capacity. In the last few decades automatic control techniques for the regulation of these storage and redirection elements have been developed, with real-time, global, model-based predictive ones being widely regarded as the most efficient ones due to their capacity to take advantage of instantaneous network measurements and rain intensity forecasts. In this thesis a complete methodology to develop a real-time, global, model-based predictive controller to minimize pollution effects in combined sewer networks is proposed. The physically-based model for open-channel flow is based on a set of partial differential equations, which must be solved numerically. Since in a real-time predictive control strategy the model equations must be solved many times to evaluate the effect of different control actions, the time needed to solve the equations limits the use of the physically-based model to small network instances with simple topologies. Therefore, it is a common practice to use simplified control-oriented models for real-time control. The first part of the thesis is focused on the development, calibration and validation of a simplified control-oriented model for water transport in combined sewer networks, taking into account three main features: accuracy, calibration ease and computational speed. The proposed model describes the flows through the most common elements and hydraulic structures present in combined sewer networks, some of which requiring the use of piecewise equations. Once the model equations are presented, calibration procedures to compute all the model parameters are developed. The modelling and calibration methodology is then applied to a real case study and validation results are provided. Finally, sensitivity analysis is conducted with respect to both the most relevant model parameters and the intensity of the considered rain scenarios. The second part of the thesis is devoted to model-based optimal control. First, the piecewise equations of the model are reformulated to obtain a general expression of the system by means of a set of linear equations and inequalities including continuous and binary variables. Using this general expression, matrix-based procedures for the formulation of Optimal Control Problems and State Estimation Problems are presented. Using an implementation of the case study network in a commercial sewer network simulator solving the complete physically-based model equations as virtual reality, the proposed model-based controller is evaluated. By iteratively solving State Estimation Problems and Optimal Control Problems and using the simulator to provide network measurements, a Receding Horizon Control strategy is simulated. The inclusion of State Estimation Problems in the control loop allows to perform output feedback control simulations taking into account that in a sewer network the number of available measurements is limited. Finally, a discussion of the results obtained with these simulations corresponding to different measurement availability scenarios is provided.Les xarxes de clavegueram combinades transporten conjuntament aigües residuals i aigües pluvials. En absència de pluges, tota l'aigua és conduïda cap a plantes de tractament on és degudament tractada abans de ser retornada als cossos aquàtics adjacents. En canvi, durant episodis de pluja intensa, la capacitat de la xarxa pot esdevenir insuficient donant lloc a inundacions en zones urbanes i abocaments d'aigua no tractada als medis receptors. Per tal de mitigar aquests efectes, les xarxes de clavegueram combinades acostumen a disposar de dipòsits de retenció i elements de redistribució del cabal, regulats amb la finalitat d'aprofitar al màxim la capacitat de la xarxa. En les últimes dècades s'han desenvolupat tècniques de control automàtic per a la regulació d'aquests elements d'emmagatzematge i redistribució, essent el control a temps real, global i predictiu basat en models la tècnica considerada més eficient, donat que és capaç de tenir en compte mesures instantànies del sistema i prediccions d'intensitat de pluja. En aquesta tesi, es proposa una metodologia completa per al desenvolupament d'un controlador a temps real, global i predictiu basat en model per minimitzar els efectes contaminants en xarxes de clavegueram combinades. El model físic que descriu els fluxos en canals oberts es basa en un sistema d'equacions en derivades parcials que s'ha de resoldre numèricament. Com que en una estratègia de control predictiu a temps real les equacions del model s'han de resoldre moltes vegades per avaluar els efectes de diferents accions de control, el temps necessari per resoldre les equacions limita l'ús del model físic a xarxes petites i amb topologies simples. Per tant, és una pràctica habitual utilitzar models simplificats orientats a control per al control a temps real. La primera part de la tesi es centra en el desenvolupament, calibratge i validació d'un model simplificat orientat a control del moviment de l'aigua en xarxes de clavegueram combinades, tenint en compte tres característiques principals: la precisió, la facilitat de calibratge i la velocitat computacional. El model presentat descriu el cabal a través dels elements i estructures hidràuliques més comunes en xarxes de clavegueram combinades, algunes de les quals requereixen l'ús de funcions definides a trossos. Una vegada les equacions del model han estat presentades, es desenvolupen procediments per al calibratge de tots els paràmetres del model. La metodologia de modelat i calibratge és aleshores aplicada a un cas d'estudi corresponent a una xarxa de clavegueram real i es presenten resultats de validació. Finalment, es duu a terme una anàlisi de sensitivitat respecte als paràmetres més rellevants del model i respecte a la intensitat dels escenaris de pluja considerats. La segona part de la tesi està dedicada al control òptim basat en el model. En primer lloc, les equacions definides a trossos del model són reformulades per obtenir una expressió del sistema en termes d'un conjunt d'equacions i desigualtats lineals incloent variables contínues i binàries. Usant aquesta expressió general es presenta un procediment basat en matrius per a la formulació de problemes de Control Òptim i Estimació d'Estat. Mitjançant una implementació de la xarxa del cas d'estudi en un simulador comercial de xarxes de clavegueram que resol les equacions del model físic complet com a realitat virtual, s'avalua el controlador basat en model descrit anteriorment. Resolent iterativament problemes d'Estimació d'Estat i de Control Òptim i utilitzant el simulador per obtenir mesures, se simula una estratègia de control amb horitzó lliscant. La inclusió de problemes d'Estimació d'Estat en llaç de control permet la simulació del controlador amb output feedback, tenint en compte que el nombre de mesures disponibles en una xarxa de clavegueram és limitat. Finalment, es discuteixen els resultats obtinguts en aquestes simulacions corresponents a diferents escenaris de disponibilitat de mesure