Seminar:  Seminar "Finite control set model predictive control: long prediction horizons and guidelines to maximize the performance "
Given by:  Dr. Tobias Geyer, Corporate Executive Engineer, ABB Switzerland Ltd
Date: November 7, 2022
Time:  10:00 a.m. to 12:00 hours.
Location: Room 215 of the Higher Technical School of Engineering of the University of Seville.

This lecture provides an introduction to finite control set model predictive control (FCS-MPC), which is very popular in academia. Although only a one-step horizon is usually used, FCS-MPC performs particularly well when adopting long prediction horizons. To solve the underlying integer optimization problem, a tailored branch-and-bound method will be presented, which can be implemented on an FPGA with real-time guarantees. Application examples will be discussed, including converters with LC filters, which necessitate the use of long horizons. The lecture concludes with a critical assessment of FCS-MPC that identifies some of the obstacles to be addressed to make FCS-MPC a success not only in academia but also in industry.

Brief CV of the speaker Dr. Tobias Geyer

Tobias Geyer (IEEE Fellow) received the Dipl.-Ing.
and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering and the Habilitation degree in power electronics from ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland, in 2000, 2005, and 2017, respectively. After his Ph.D., he spent three years with GE Global Research, Munich, Germany, three years with the University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand, and eight years with ABB's Corporate Research Centre, Baden-Dättwil, Switzerland. There, in 2016, he became a Senior Principal Scientist for power conversion control. He was appointed as an extraordinary Professor with Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa, from 2017 to 2023. In mid 2020, Tobias joined ABB's medium-voltage drives business as R&D platform manager of the ACS6000/6080. In parallel, he is a Corporate Executive Engineer for control methods of power converters and electrical machines. Furthermore, he is an external lecturer at ETH Zurich for the course Predictive Control of Power Electronic Systems. Dr. Geyer was the recipient of the Semikron Innovation Award and the Nagamori Award, both in 2021. He is also the recipient of the 2017 First Place Prize Paper Award in the Transactions on Power Electronics, the 2014 Third Place Prize Paper Award in the Transactions on Industry Applications, and of two Prize Paper Awards at conferences. He is a former Associate Editor for the Transactions on Industry Applications from 2011 to 2014 and the Transactions on Power Electronics from 2013 to 2019. He was an International Program Committee Vice Chair of the IFAC conference on Nonlinear Model Predictive Control in Madison, WI, USA , in 2018. He is a Distinguished Lecturer of the Power Electronics Society in the years 2020 and 2021.