A Fault Diagnosis and Control Integrated System for an SP-100 Space Reactor

In this paper, a fault diagnosis and control integrated system (FDCIS) was developed to control the thermoelectric (TE) power in the SP-100 space reactor. The objectives of the proposed model predictive control were to minimize both the difference between the predicted TE power and the desired power, and the variation of control drum angle that adjusts the control reactivity. Also, the objectives were subject to maximum and minimum control drum angle and maximum drum angle variation speed. A genetic algorithm was used to optimize the model predictive controller. The model predictive controller was integrated with a fault detection and diagnostics algorithm so that the controller can work properly even under input and output measurement faults. With the presence of faults, the control law was reconfigured using online estimates of the measurements. Simulation results of the proposed controller showed that the TE generator power level controlled by the proposed controller could track the target power level effectively even under measurement faults, satisfying all control constraints.