Development of an Efficient Vehicle Energy Management System for Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles 2024-26-0173

Fuel cell electric vehicles generally have two power sources – the fuel cell power system and a high voltage battery pack - to power the vehicle operations. The fuel cell power system is the main source of power for the vehicle and its operations are supported by the battery pack. The battery pack helps to tackle the dynamic power demands from the vehicle such as during acceleration, to which the response of the fuel cell might be slower. The battery is also used to recover the energy from regeneration during braking and can also be used to extend the range of the vehicle in case the storage tanks runs out of hydrogen. In order to maximize the fuel efficiency of the fuel cell power system it is critical that these two power sources are used in conjunction with each other in an optimal manner. The two power sources must operate such that the power demand from the vehicle is met at all times without over exerting either of these two sources as this can lead to drop in life and health of the battery pack and/or FCPS. In this paper an energy management system for a fuel cell bus meant for intra-city application is developed whereby the operational efficiency of the stack as well as the performance of the battery pack is maximized while delivering the power required by the vehicle. Additionally, the energy management logic ensures sufficient SOC is always maintained in the battery pack to provide a minimum pure electric range. The parameters of this model are tuned using simulations and the final model with the tuned parameters are validated in field trials.