Survey on higher-level advanced control for grinding circuits operation

Abstract Grinding circuit (GC) is the most critical production unit and it also has the highest energy consumption in mineral processing operations. The control and optimization of GC are regarded as important ways to improve product quality and production efficiency of the whole concentration process. The fundamental goal of the automation system of GC is to make the outputs of the controlled processes best follow the control set-points. Moreover, from the standpoint of process engineering, it should as well ensure that the grinding product quality and efficiency during production phase are well controlled within the optimal ranges. Those goals cannot be achieved solely at the level of basic feedback control where global operational indices are not considered. Therefore, higher-level advanced control is required for the whole grinding plant operation to achieve integrated control and optimization of the indices of control, operation and mineralogical economics. This paper overviews the available advanced control methods and technologies for improving operation of GC system based on our experiences of research and practice in this field. A brief introduction of GC and its advanced control problem for process operation are presented first. Then, a comprehensive and systematic review on the available methods and technologies of higher-level grinding advanced control is given. The emphasis of this review is on the approach of data & knowledge based hybrid intelligent advanced feedback control. Issues about the future research on the advanced control of GC are outlined when concluding the paper.