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Godzilla is helping ITER prepare for tokamak assembly
ITER employees stand by Godzilla, the most powerful commercially available industrial robot available. (Photo: ITER)
Many people are familiar with Godzilla as a giant reptilian monster that emerged from the sea off the coast of Japan, the product of radioactive contamination. These days, there is a new Godzilla, but it has a positive—and entirely fact-based—association with nuclear energy. This one has emerged inside the Tokamak Assembly Preparation Building of ITER in southern France.
Chen-Kuo Weng, Robert M. Edwards, Asok Ray
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 117 | Number 3 | July 1994 | Pages 177-185
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE94-A28532
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A robust feedforward-feedback controller is proposed for wide-range operations of nuclear reactors. This control structure provides (a) optimized performance over a wide operating range resulting from the feedforward element and (b) guaranteed robust stability and performance resulting from the feedback element. The feedforward control law is synthesized via nonlinear programming, which generates an optimal control sequence over a finite-time horizon under specified constraints. The feedback control is synthesized via the structured singular value µ approach to guarantee robustness in the presence of disturbances and modeling uncertainties. The results of simulation experiments are presented to demonstrate efficacy of the proposed control structure for a large rapid power reduction to avoid unnecessary plant trips.