Dynamic disturbance rejection controllers for neutral time delay systems with application to a central heating system

In the present paper the problem of disturbance rejection of single input-single output neutral time delay systems with multiple measurable disturbances is solved via dynamic controllers. In particular, the general form of the controller matrices is presented, while the necessary and sufficient conditions for the controller to be realizable are offered. The proposed technique is applied to a test case neutral time delay central heating system. In particular, the nonlinear model of the plant and its linearized approximation are presented. Based on the linearized model, a two-stage controller is designed in order to regulate the room temperature and the boiler effluent temperature. The performance of the closed loop system is investigated through computational experiments.