PLC and SCADA based temperature control of heat exchanger system through fractional order PID controller using metaheuristic optimization techniques

SCADA systems play an important role in tracking the behaviour of critical process variables and connecting geographically dispersed subsystems at the industrial plant level. This article presents a PLC and SCADA-based control framework to automate and supervise the temperature control processes in the heat exchanger plant. The OMRON (NX1P2-9024DT1) PLC is interfaced with the Wonderware InTouch SCADA system to gather data, create a simulated temperature control prototype and carry out the necessary control operations within the heat exchanger plant. The PLC controls the entire process and programming of PLC is done using Sysmac studio automation software using the ladder programming language. The proposed system controls the temperature of the heat exchanger system through PID and Fractional Order PID (P \({\text{I}}^{\uplambda }{\text{D}}^{\upmu }\) ${\text{I}}^{\mathrm{\lambda }}{\text{D}}^{\mathrm{\mu }}$ ) controllers with Integral Anti-windup technique. Various control strategies like Cascade Control, Feedforward Control and Smith Predictor for time delayed process are discussed for controlling the temperature of the process. The performance of both PID and fractional order PID controllers is optimized using adaptive heuristic optimization techniques like Genetic Algorithm (GA), Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) and Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO). In control system design and analysis, the calculated performance indices are used as quantitative measures for evaluating the performance of a system. The combined form of temperature controller with Cascade control, Feedforward control and dead-time compensator is modelled and examined for simulation using MATLAB. Simulation and real-time experimentation analysis of the developed controllers are executed with metaheuristic optimization techniques based on different performance indices like ISE, IAE and ITAE.