AWWA DSS58731

This paper presents the results to-date from a current AWWARF Research Project TC- 2838. The research project is a joint collaboration between EPCOR Water Services and the University of Alberta, both located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. The system is being developed for the Port Hardy (British Columbia, Canada) water treatment plant, which regularly experiences very rapid and wide fluctuations in river water quality, particularly organic levels. The overall objective of the project is to develop and implement an advanced model-based process control system to operate the plant more efficiently. The system uses ANN's to model the DAF (Dissolved Air Flotation) clarifier and integrates them with the plant Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system for real-time control. An innovative control system was developed to ensure that all constraints and targets imposed on the operation of the plant (such as production rates and water quality parameters) were simultaneously achieved. Includes 18 references, tables, figures.