Spectral principal component analysis of dynamic process data

Spectral PCA and principal component analysis of the power spectra of data from chemical processes offered an improvement over PCA using the time domain signals even when time shifting was used to align the phases.

Abstract

This article describes principal component analysis (PCA) of the power spectra of data from chemical processes. Spectral PCA can be applied to the measurements from a whole unit or plant because spectra are invariant to the phase lags caused by time delays and process dynamics. The same comment applies to PCA using autocovariance functions, which was also studied. Two case studies are presented. One was derived from simulation of a pulp process. The second was from a refinery involving 37 tags. In both cases, PCA clusters were observed which were characterised by distinct spectral features. Spectral PCA was compared with PCA using autocovariance functions. The performance was similar, and both offered an improvement over PCA using the time domain signals even when time shifting was used to align the phases.