Online Feasibility and Effectiveness of a Spatio-temporal Nonlinear Model Predictive Control. The Case of Methanol Synthesis Reactor

This work provides the theoretical formulation, implementation directives and validation case for the extension of the nonlinear model predictive control from the time domain to the spatio-temporal domain. Effectiveness and online feasibility are demonstrated for industrial processes of distributed nature. The case of methanol synthesis (control of hot-spot temperature and axial position) is selected.