A growing number of glass furnaces and forehearths are being equipped with supervisory control systems. Daily regulation of fossil fuel firing and electric energy supply to stabilise temperatures is no longer in the hands of the operator but fully taken over automatically by the ES III MPC controller, which provides consistent process control, 24h/day. This article describes the ES III Advanced Control System, a tool that helps operators in the daily operation of furnaces, as well as the furnace manager being able to reach his targets for producing glass of the highest quality, with minimum energy and costs. In this article, Gerresheimer Glass agreed to participate in the paper and share its experiences. At their Lohr factory, annual energy savings of 4.3% were realised at a production of 130/tpd.
