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This paper details the control system development process for the University of Washington (UW) EcoCAR 2 team over the three years of the competition. Particular emphasis is placed upon the control system development and validation process executed during Year 3 of the competition in an effort to meet Vehicle Technical Specifications (VTS) established and refined by the team. The EcoCAR 2 competition challenges 15 universities across North America to reduce the environmental impact of a 2013 Chevrolet Malibu without compromising consumer acceptability. The project takes place over a three year design cycle, where teams select a hybrid architecture and fuel choice before defining a set of VTS goals for the vehicle. These VTS are selected based on the desired static and dynamic performance targets to balance fuel consumption and emissions with consumer acceptability requirements.

The Hybrid Electric Vehicle Team of Virginia Tech (HEVT) is participating in the 2009 - 2011 EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge Advanced Vehicle Technology Competition series organized by Argonne National Lab (ANL), and sponsored by General Motors Corporation (GM), and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Following GM's Vehicle Development Process (VDP), HEVT established team goals that meet or exceed the competition requirements for EcoCAR in the design of a plug-in extended range hybrid electric vehicle. The competition requires participating teams to re-engineer a stock crossover utility vehicle donated by GM. The result of this design process is an Extended Range Electric Vehicle (EREV) that uses grid electric energy and E85 fuel for propulsion. The vehicle design has achieved an SAE J1711 utility factor corrected fuel consumption of 2.9 L(ge)/100 km (82 mpgge) with an all-electric range of 87 km (54 miles) [1].