Modeling and simulation of hybrid electric vehicles

Abstract

With increasing oil price and mounting environment concerns, cleaner and sustainable energy solutions have been demanded. At present transportation constitutes a large portion of the energy consumed and pollution created. In this work, two hybrid vehicle powertrain technologies were studied, a fuel cell - battery hybrid and two internal combustion engine - battery/ultracapacitor hybrids. Powertrain performance models were built to simulate the performance of these new designs, and to assess the feasibility of a fuel cell hybrid power backup system for a special type of vehicles, elevators in high-rise buildings, using the ADvanced VehIcle SimulatOR (ADVISOR) first. The model was then applied to evaluate the two-mode hybrid powertrain for more common vehicles - commercial trucks, showing potential fuel consumption reduction. To improve modeling accuracy, a new and more flexible tool for modeling multi-physics systems, Modelica/Dymola, was used to carry out the modeling and analysis of next generation hybrid electric vehicles, exploring the potentials of new hybrid powertrain architectures and energy storage system designs. The study forms the foundation for further research and developments.