Optimal control of load-following operations in a pressurized water reactor

According to the optimal control theory, the problem of load-following operation in a pressurized water reactor is formulated as a nonlinear-quadratic optimal control problem. One-dimensional core model is adopted. A successful optimization algorithm DDPSR is proposed to solving the obtained problem. The research results show that the DDPSR can converge with a long time interval and needs very small iteration number and computing time, and the practical reactor can be fairly operated in an optimal load-following manner and axial offset satisfies the required value from beginning to end. Control characters of boron concentration are discussed specially