Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering, Vol.12, No.5, 673-676, 2004
A modified model for flexibility analysis in chemical engineering processes
This paper discussed an extended model for flexibility analysis of chemical process. Under uncertainty, probability density function is used to describe uncertain parameters instead of hyper-rectangle, and chance-constrained programming is a feasible way to deal with the violation of constraints. Because the feasible region of control variables would change along with uncertain parameters, its smallest acceptable size threshold is presented to ensure the controllability condition. By synthesizing the considerations mentioned above, a modified model can describe the flexibility analysis problem more exactly. Then a hybrid algorithm, which integrates stochastic simulation and genetic algorithm, is applied to solve this model and maximize the flexibility region. Both numerical and chemical process examples are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the method.
Keywords:flexibility analysis;chance-constrained programming;stochastic simulation;genetic algorithm