Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 September 2016
In this paper, we investigate the error estimates of mixed finite element methods for optimal control problems governed by general elliptic equations. The state and co-state are approximated by the lowest order Raviart-Thomas mixed finite element spaces and the control variable is approximated by piecewise constant functions. We derive L2 and H–1-error estimates both for the control variable and the state variables. Finally, a numerical example is given to demonstrate the theoretical results.