1. Introduction
In the first part of this survey, the main features of solar
plants with a distributed collector system (DCS) from the
viewpoints of modeling, simulation and basic control have
been studied. A classification of control strategies introduced
by Seborg (1999) has been considered to classify
the different control approaches successfully used to control
such kind of plants. This paper is devoted to overview
advanced control techniques aimed at taking into account
the special dynamic features of distributed solar collectors
and the fact that the main source of energy cannot be
manipulated and furthermore it changes in a seasonal
and on a daily base, acting as a disturbance when considering
it from a control point of view. Some of these advanced
control disciplines have evolved around the Linear Systems
Control Community, as is the case of robust control (RC)
or adaptive control (AC), while other disciplines have
developed around the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Control
Community, as is the case of knowledge based systems
(KBS) also called ‘‘expert systems’’, neural network controllers
(NNC) and fuzzy logic controllers (FLC). Many
of the applications included in this paper have been tested
in the Acurex field of the Plataforma Solar de Almerı´a
(PSA, South-East Spain), see part I of this survey for a
complete description.