A data-driven surrogate-assisted evolutionary algorithm applied to a many-objective blast furnace optimization problem

A new data-driven reference vector-guided evolutionary algorithm has been successfully implemented to construct surrogate models for various objectives pertinent to an industrial blast furnace. A total of eight objectives have been modeled using the operational data of the furnace using 12 process variables identified through a principal component analysis and optimized simultaneously. The capability of this algorithm to handle a large number of objectives, which has been lacking earlier, results in a more efficient setting of the operational parameters of the furnace, leading to a precisely optimized hot metal production process.