DESIGN OF FEEDWATER HEATER TEMPERATURE CONTROL SYSTEM USING PLC-BASED PID-PSO CONTROL

Abstract

Temperature control in a feedwater heater system is essential for maintaining stability and efficiency in water heating processes, yet conventional systems without control tend to produce uncontrolled temperature oscillations. This study aims to design and implement a temperature control system for a feedwater heater using PID control tuned with the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) method based on a Haiwell PLC. Optimal PID parameters were obtained through PSO simulation on a transfer function model derived from open-loop testing using ITAE as the objective function, resulting in parameters Kp=600, Ki=1.345, Kd=200 with a 30-particle configuration. Testing was conducted by comparing three conditions: without PID, PID with trial and error tuning, and PID-PSO, using 18 liters of water across setpoints of 40°C, 50°C, and 60°C. Results show that PID-PSO achieved the best performance with overshoot below 2% and steady-state errors of 0.2°C, 0.15°C, and 0.1°C at each respective setpoint, outperforming both the non-PID and trial and error methods. This study proves that the combination of PID control and PSO tuning is effective for temperature control of a PLC-based feedwater heater system.