Economic MPC with a contractive constraint for nonlinear systems

In this paper, we consider the stability issue of economic model predictive control (EMPC) for constrained nonlinear systems and propose a new contractive constraint formulation of nonlinear EMPC schemes. This formulation is one of Lyapunov-based approaches in which the contractive function chosen a priori can be used as a Lyapunov function. Some conditions are given to guarantee recursive feasibility and asymptotic stability of the EMPC. Moreover, we analyze the transient economic performance of the EMPC closed-loop system in some finite-time intervals. The proposed EMPC scheme is applied to a chemical reactor model to illustrate its utility and benefits. Copyright (c) 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.