Process Dynamics and Control

ChEg4102

January Semester 2024

Dr. Sintayehu Mekuria Hailegiorgis and Mrs. Haimanot Tibebe

Department of Chemical Engineering

College of Engineering
Addis Ababa Science and Technology University
27 May 2024 Dr.Sintayehu Mekuria Hailegiorgis and Mrs.Haimanot Tibebe 2
 Chapter Objectives
At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:
1. Formulate the characteristic equation of a closed-loop
system
2. Determine the stability of control systems using Routh
Hurwitz Criteria

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 Introduction
• An important consequence of feedback control is that it can
cause oscillatory responses.

• Under certain circumstances, the oscillations may be

undamped or even have amplitude that increases with time
until a physical limit is reached.

• In these situations, the closed-loop system is said to be

unstable.

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 General Stability Criterion:
• Most industrial processes are stable without feedback controllers.
They are said to be open-loop stable or self-regulating.

• Definition of stability: An unconstrained linear system is said to be

stable if the output response is bounded for all bounded inputs.
Otherwise, it is said to be unstable.

• By a bounded input, we mean an input variable that stays within

upper and lower limits for all values of time.

• The term unconstrained refer to the ideal situation where there is

no physical limits on the input and output variables.

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 Characteristic Equation
Consider the closed-loop equation. It is already developed for
feedback control system :
K mGcGvG p Gd (9.1)
Y Ysp  D
1  GOL 1  GOL

Where, GOL= GcGvGpGm

The stability of the closed-loop system is determined by the poles of

the closed-loop transfer function.
The poles of the transfer function are the roots of the Characteristic
Equation:
1  GOL  0 (9.2) Characteristic
equation

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 Characteristic equation
• If GOL is a ratio of polynomials in s, then the closed-loop
transfer function is also a rational function. Then, it can be
factored into poles (pi) and zeroes (zi) as
•
Y ( s  z1 )( s  z 2 )....(s  z m )
 K (9.3)
Ysp ( s  p1 )( s  p 2 )....(s  p n )

• where K’ is a multiplicative constant selected to give the correct

steady-state gain.
• To have a physically realizable system, the number of poles must
be greater than or equal to the number of zeroes.
• The poles are also the roots of the characteristic equation of the
closed-loop system:

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 Characteristic equation
For a unit step change in set-point, (9.3) becomes
K  ( s  z1 )(s  z2 )....(s  zm ) (9.4)
Y
s ( s  p1 )(s  p2 )....(s  pn )

If there are no repeat roots (all distinct poles), then the

partial fraction expansion of (9.4) has the form

Y
A0

A1

A2
 ... 
An (9.5)
s ( s  p1 ) ( s  p2 ) ( s  pn )

Taking the inverse Laplace transform of (9.5) gives

y (t )  Ao  A1e p1t  A2 e p2t  ....  An e pnt (9.6)

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 Characteristic equation
Suppose that one of the poles is a positive real number; i.e.,
pk > 0.

Then it is clear from (9.6) that y(t) is unbounded and thus the
closed-loop system is unstable.

If pk is a complex number, with a positive real part, then the

system is also unstable.

If all the poles are negative (or have negative real parts) then
the system is stable.

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 Characteristic equation
Imaginary
Stability region in the
complex plane for the
roots of the characteristic
equation.

Stable Unstable region

Real
Stable

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 General stability criterion:
A feedback control system is stable if and only if
all roots of the characteristic equation are
negative or have negative real parts. Otherwise,
the system is unstable.

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 Graphical interpretation of stability criterion:

Roots of
1 + GcGvGpGm= 0

(Each test is for

different value of Kc)

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 Graphical interpretation of stability criterion:
• If the characteristic equation is either first-order or second-
order, we can find the roots analytically.
• For higher-order polynomials, we have to use other
techniques.

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 Routh Stability Criterion
Uses an analytical technique for determining whether any
roots of a polynomial have positive real parts.

Characteristic equation

a n s n  a n 1 s n 1    a1 s  a 0  0 (9.7)

where an >0. According to the Routh criterion, if any of the

coefficients a0, a1, aK, an-1 are negative or zero, then at least one
root of the characteristic equation lies in the RHP, and thus, the
system is unstable. On the other hand, if all of the coefficients
are positive, then one must construct the Routh Array.

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 Routh Array
Routh Array

For stability, all elements in the first column must be

positive.

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 Routh Array
The first two rows of the Routh Array are comprised of the coefficients
in the characteristics equation.
The elements in the remaining rows are calculated from coefficients
using the formulas:

an1an2  an an3 an 1an  4  an an 5

b1  b2 
an1 an 1

b1an 3  an 1b2 b1an 5  an 1b3

c1  c2 
b1 b1

• n+1 rows must be constructed

• n = order of the characteristic eqn.)

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 Routh Stability Criterion:

A necessary and sufficient condition for all roots of the characteristic

equation to have negative real parts is that all of the elements in
the left column of the Routh array must be positive.
Example 9.1
Determine the stability of a system that has the characteristic
equation

s 4  5s 3  3s 2  1  0
Solution: Because the s term is missing, its coefficient is zero.
Thus the system is unstable.

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 Routh Stability Criterion:
Example 9.2
Determine the stability of a system that has the characteristic
equation
6s 4  12s 3  8s 2  9s  7  0
Routh Array
Row (12  8)  (6  9)
c1   3.5
12
1 6 8 7
(12  7)  (6  0)
2 12 9 0 c2  7
12
3 c1=3.5 c2 =7 0 (3.5  9)  (12  7)
d1   15
3.5
4 d1=-15 0 0 (15  7)  (3.5  0)
e1  7
5 e1= 7 0 0  15

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 Example
Example 9.3
The transfer functions of a process, the control valve and the
measurement are given below. Determine the values of the
controller gain for which a simple feedback control system
with proportional controller will be stable.
0.2 5 1
Gp  Gv  Gm 
5s  1 s 1 2s  1
Solution

Characteristic equation
1  Gc Gv G p Gm  0

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 Example
Inserting, the transfer functions
5 0.2 1
1  Kc 0
( s  1) (5s  1) (2s  1)
Rearranging we get

10 s 3  17 s 2  8s  1  K C  0
All coefficients are positive provided that 1+Kc > 0 or Kc >
-1. Therefore, we have to construct the Routh Array to
determine the satbility.

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 Example
The Routh array is:

1 10 8
2 17 1+Kc 17(8)  101  K C 
c1 
17
3 c1 0
4 d1 0 d1  1  KC

To have a stable system, each element in the left column must

be positive, c1>0 and d1 > 0

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 Example
17(8)  101  K C 
c1  0
17
17(8)
KC   1  12.6
10

From d1
K C  1

Therefore, for the closed-loop system to be stable -1< Kc < 12.6

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 Conclusion!
• Concept of stability
• Criteria for stability
• Routh Hurwitz Stability Analysis

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