Research on Centralized Control System Design and Energy Saving Strategies for Air Compressor Clusters in Power Semiconductor Manufacturing Plants Based on PLC

To address challenges in compressed air systems for power semiconductor manufacturing plants—including significant pressure fluctuations, prolonged idle periods, insufficient post-processing coordination, and coarse energy management—we propose a PLC-centric centralized control system for air compressor clusters. The system establishes an integrated architecture encompassing sensor acquisition, actuator coordination, human-machine interaction, communication diagnostics, and alarm protection mechanisms, structured around the "main unit, gas storage, drying, gas distribution, and load" operational chain. Key energy-saving strategies include variable load regulation based on pressure ranges, balanced runtime scheduling, time-of-use gas storage with peak-valley electricity pricing, and idle suppression mechanisms. Case study from an air compressor station retrofit in a power semiconductor manufacturing workshop demonstrated that the system successfully maintained total pipeline pressure fluctuations within ±0.013 MPa, reduced idle ratios by 11 percentage points, and decreased unit gas supply power consumption by 9.6%. These findings provide practical references for centralized control systems in power semiconductor manufacturing plant air compressor clusters.