Model Predictive Control and Thrust Allocation for Dynamic Positioning of Vessels

Abstract

The Dynamic Positioning (DP) system can keep the horizontal position and orientation of the marine vessel by the propulsion system, which contains control and optimization thrust allocation algorithms. This paper proposed the method of MPC and thrust allocation that can satisfy multiple constraints under the hydrodynamic interaction effects in the DP system. The output of the MPC controller is the forces and moments of a vessel. Then, the desired generalized forces and moments are distributed to the multiple thrusters to control the vessel by the optimal thrust allocation technique considering the hydrodynamic interaction effects of thruster-hull and thruster-thruster. The thrust allocation algorithm would get the optimized solution of all thrusters considering the fuel consumption and control command in the surge, sway, and yaw. A 1/30 scaled model was designed and the hydrodynamic interaction and the DP experiment were carried out with the environmental disturbances. The time series of motion is provided and illustrates that the MPC and thrust allocation algorithm is very efficient for the DP vessel.