Episode 45 · Process Control
Process Control, Part 3: Beyond PID
The Process Control finale moves to a distillation column where separate loops can fight over the same process. Interaction, the relative gain array and decoupling explain why pairing measurements and manipulated variables matters. Model predictive control introduces a way to coordinate decisions while considering the plant ahead. The episode then revisits the operating story and emerging approaches, completing the series' journey from process dynamics to coordinated control.
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Inside this episode
- Recap and cold open: the column
- How a distillation column works, in two minutes
- Interaction: pulling on the same tablecloth
- The relative gain array: a quick test for fighting
- Decoupling: a translator between the knobs
- Model predictive control: playing chess with the plant
- Inside the optimiser, in words
- Why MPC conquered refineries
- Building an MPC: Ines and column two
- MPC's weaknesses: models age
- Where the money is: shifting the average
- The control hierarchy: a pyramid of time
- Monitoring thousands of loops
- Inferential measurements and soft sensors
- Plantwide control: the problem of recycles
- Controlling startups, grade changes and the abnormal
- A day in the pyramid
- The future: what's changing
- Ines, two years on
- The series in one breath
- Closing
Production credits & AI disclosure
Scripts generated with Claude Opus. Synthetic narration generated with Edge TTS. Reviewed, listened to, and approved by Sankalp Thakur.