FUZZY LOGIC CONTROL OF A pH NEUTRALIZATION PROCESS

Ranganath Muthu Elamin El Kanzi

Department of Chemical Engineering

University of Bahrain
rmuthu@eng.uob.bh elkanzi@eng.uob.bh

ABSTRACT 2. THE pH NEUTRALIZATION PROCESS

In this paper, fuzzy logic control of a pH neutralization
process is attempted. The pH neutralization process is a
classic example of a highly nonlinear system. For
nonlinear systems, fuzzy logic control provides a better
alternative to the classical proportional plus integral (PI)
controller. Both the controllers namely the PI controller
and fuzzy logic controller (FLC) are designed for a
simulated pH neutralization process. It is shown that the
FLC is able to control the pH neutralization process
better. The simulation is performed in the MATLAB
environment using Simulink and Fuzzy Logic Toolbox.
1. INTRODUCTION
pH control is a common issue in many industrial
processes. The basic idea is to control the pH variations
in some liquid flow, usually making the pH as close to I
as possible. This influent liquid flows into a tank, where
it is mixed with an amount of a concentrated reagent to
alter its pH. If the effluent is acidic with a pH of 4, the
reagent would be basic with a pH larger than 10. The
reagent is more concentrated than the effluent, since it is
desirable to add as little volume to the effluent as
possible.
The pH is controlled in a tank - the influent flows
into the top of the tank, and the reagent is also added to
the top of the tank. The tank is well stirred so that the pH
is uniform throughout the tank. The effluent is pumped
out at the bottom of the tank, as shown in the Fig. 1.

Fuzzy Logic Controllers (FLCs) allow for a simpler

human like approach to control system design and do not
need the mathematical model as in the case of
conventional control design methods. For non-linear
systems, controlling with conventional controllers such
as PI, is difficult. FLCs provide reasonable and effective
alternatives to classical controllers. By using a linguistic
approach, fuzzy set theory can he integrated into control
theory using rules of the form, If {condition] THEN
{action}. Using enough of these rules one can create a
limctional controller. In the same way, the input
variables can be partitioned into overlapping sets that
have a linguistic correlation (i.e., large, small, very Figure 1. A pH Neutralization Process
small) to form a membership function. Most often than
not these fuzzy sets are triangular in shape. The 2.1 System Model
membership values control the degree to which each rule
From elementary mass balance considerations, it can be
firs, illustrating the interdependent relationship
shown that an appropriate state space model for the
between rule sets and membership functions [I].
strong acid-strong base system is [2]
In this paper, a fuzzy logic controller (FLC) is
designed and implemented for the highly non-linear pH
neutralization process. The performance of the FLC is
compared with the conventional proportional plus
integral (PI) controller.

0-7803-8163-7/03/$17.00 0 2003 IEEE ICECS-2003

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Where
c, is is the excess hydrogen ion concentration in
the effluent stream (moIL)
c,,(t) is the excess hydrogen ion concentration of
the reagent (mol/L)
c,(t) is the excess hydrogen ion concentration in
the influent stream (mol/L)
u(t) is the flow rate of the reagent (Us)
q(t) is the flow rate ofthe influent stream us)
V is the volume of the tank (L)
Normally, the reagent concentration is constant, and we
control the effluent pH by varying the reagent flow. The
concentrations are excess concentrations, meaning that
they measure the concentration of hydrogen ions in
excess to that found in water. We can convert an excess
concentration C to pH using the following formula.
PH = -log[ 40.25c:+ 10-l~.+OX]
(2)
The parameter values are chosen as
c. : -10-2mol/L
ci : 10' m o m
9 : 10Umin
V : 83.67 L
maximum reagent flow, U : 0.025 U s
3. DESIGN OF PI CONTROLLER
We assume that the tank system has a level controller
that maintains a constant liquid volume in the tank. The
reagent flow is controlled using a simple PI controller as
shown in the Fig. 2. The control valve on the reagent
pipe has saturation, since it can be hlly open (giving a
maximum flow rate) or fully closed (giving a minimum
flow rate of zero). We assume that the control valve
allows a maximum reagent flow rate of 1.5 W min. The
parameters of the PI controller are chosen as K, = 0.03
and Ti = 0.06s by trial and error, to give the hest
FesPonse, - - .-. .--
i .
-- ..- _I_".
-'I.!
!
! i
I
j I
I I
! .~..- . --
. _..______.. -
..- -j
_I
Figure 2. Conventional Control System
4. DESIGN O F FUZZY LOGIC
CONTROLLER
Fig. 3 shows the block diagram of an FLC [3]. The
components of conventional and fuzzy systems are
almost alike. The difference mainly being that fuzzy
systems contain "fiuzifiers", "knowledge base", and
"decision making logic'' and "defuzzifiers". The
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operations performed by a fuzzy logic (controller are as
follows [4,5]:
4.1. Fuzzification
Fuzzification can be considered as a mapping 6om an
observed input space to fuzzy sets. The fuzzification
interface performs the following functions:
1. Measure the values ,of input variables at each
sampling instant.
2. Normalizes the measured variables to within the
universe of discourse (UOD).UOD is the range
of values of an input variable to the FLC.
3. Performs the function of hzzification that
converts the input data into suitable linguistic
variables.
4.2. Knowledge Base
The howledge base of an FLC has two components
namely a database and a rule base.
1. The database provides necessarf definitions that
are used to define linguistic variables and fuzzy
data manipulation in rhe FLC.
2. The rule base characterizes the control goals and
control policy by means of a set of linguistic
control rules.
4.3. Decision Making Logic
It determines the degree to which each measured value is
a member of a given labeled group. A given
measurement may he classified sirnultanmusly as
belonging to several linguistic rules. The Degree of
Fulfillment @OF) of each rule is determined by applying
the rules of Boolean Algebra 1:Union and Intersection) to
each linguistic group that is part of the rule. This is done
for all the rules in the system. Finally,, the net control
action is determined hy weighting the action associated
With Nk by the DOF.
4.4. Defuzzification
The defuzzifier converts the output fuzzy set into a crisp
solution variable. The most commonly used method of
defuzzification is the 'Center of Area' method that
generates the center of gravity of the final fuzzy control
space. It produces a result that is sensitive to all the
rules. It is given hy
m m
U = B cipi / x H (3)
i= 1 i= 1
Where
Ci is the value corresponding to the center of the
output fuzzy set
pi is the membership value of the output fuzzy set
U is the crisp value ofthe output variable
 (I..

I 0.0

:
: 0..

0.2

.* -11 .I 4.6 0 0.8 I I.5 1

Figure 3. Fuzzy Logic Conh-ol System Enno11

Figure 4(a) Membership Functions for Error

5. IMPLEMENTATION OF FLC

4.1. Fnzzifieation

4.1.1. Selection of FLC Variables

The input variables used for the FLC are
a. 'Error e(t)', which the difference between the
desired pH and the measured value of pH.
b. 'Change in Error Ae(t)', which is calculated, is
the difference between the error at the present
instant e(t) and the error at the previous instant
e(t-1).
I . . . . . , / . . I
Ae(t) = e(t) - e(-1) (4) -1 4.1 .o, 4.2 .DI 0 ..I 01 o., 0" E.

The output variable is the 'change in output Au(t)' . The S"1xaE U Ennom

FLC output is given by Figure 4(b) Membership Functions for Change in

Error
u(t) = u(t-1) + Au(t) (5)

4.1.2. Defenninafion of the Universe of Discourse

POD)
a. The UOD for error -2 pH to +2 pH.
b. The UOD for change in error is 4 . 5 pH to +0.5
PH.
c. The UOD for change in output is -0.03 Us to
+0.03 Us.

4.1.3. Selection ofLinguislic Variables

The fuzzy input and output variables, namely Error,
Change in Error and Change in Output, are divided into
seven linguistic (fuzzy) variables namely NL (h'egative
Large), NM (Negative Medium), NS (Negative Small), Figure *e) Membership Functions for Change in
ZE (Zero), PS (Positive Small), PM (Positive Medium) output
and PL (Positive Large).
Table 1 Rule Base of the FLC
4.2. Knowledge Base
E R R 0 R e(t)
4.2.1. Data Base I INL INM INS I Z E IPS IPM I P L I
The membership functions for the input and output
variables i.e. error, change in error and change in
controller output are given in Figs. 4(a) - (c).

4.2.2. Rule Base

The rules that tie the input and output variables are
given in Table 1.

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4.3. Decision Making Logic

In the FLC, once the appropriate rules are fired, the

degree of membership of the output fuzzy variable i.e.
change in output, is determined by encoding the
antecedent fuzzy subsets, in this case error and change
in error. The max-min implication technique is used.

4.5. Defuzzification

The commonly used 'Center of Area' method is used for

defuzzification.

6. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

iiq
-
f

5.5

0
.... PIcD.eDI*r

IO 100 110
TI.
.
*<IO
,"..cond.
210 100 150 400

Figure 6. Servo response of controllers

6.1. Regulatory Response
Table 2. IAE for the pI Neutralization Process
Load disturbance is given hy varying the influent flow.
At t = 100 s, the influent flow is increased by 2% of its
nominal value. At t = 200 s, the influent flow is further
I CONTROLLER I CONTROL ACTION I
increased by 4% of its nominal value. At t=300 s, the
influent flow is decreased by 6% of its nominal value.
The response of the PI controller and FLC are shown
Fig. 5. The setpoint i s assumed as 7.25 pH.
From Fig. 5 , it is seen that the conventional PI
controller has more deviation of the controlled variable
fiom steady state than the F E . This is reflected in the
Integral Absolute Error (IAE) given in Table 2, which is . 7. CONCLUSION
2.585 for the PI controller and 0.991 for the FLC.
An FLC is successfully designed for a pH neutralization
6.2. Servo Response process. It is shown in this paper thal the FLC shows
better regulatory as well as :servo resplmse than the PI
The setpoint is initially varied fiom 7.25 pH to 7.75 pH wntroller.
at t = 100 s. The next variation of the setpoint is from
1.75 pH to 6.25 pH at t = 200 s. Finally, the setpoint is
vaned from 6.25 pH to 7.25 pH. The initial setpoint is REFERENCES
7.25 pH. The response of the PI controller and FLC are
r11 G.J. Klir and B. Yuan, Fuzzy Sets and Fuzzy Logic:
shown in Fig. 6.
Theory and Application', Prentice Hall ER,New Jersey,
From Fig. 6 it is seen that the servo response ofthe 1995.
FLC is slightly better than the PI controller with the IAE hnp:lcsd.new~stle.edu.aw'wnt~~simulationsl
121
for PI control being 1.179 and IAE for FLC being 0.866. ph-siml .html.
r31 D. Driankov, H. Hellendoorn and M. Reinfrank M, An
Znfroduction to Fuzzy Control, Narcs Publishing
House, New Delhi, 1996.
141 C.C. Lee, "Fuzzy logic control systems: Fuzzy logic
controller- Part I', IEEE Transaction!; on Systems, Man
and Cybernetics," Vol. 20, No. 2, pp. 404418, 1990.
[51 C.C. Lee, "Fuzzy logic in control systems: F- logic
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ACKNOLEDGEMEN7

The authors would like to acknowledge the financial support to

this research work by the University of Bahrain Research
Council.

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