Developing FUTURE Vehicles (Fundamental Understanding of Technologies for Ultra Reduced Emission Vehicles)

Completed

Energy Efficiency(Transport)
Other Power and Storage Technologies(Electric power conversion)
Other Power and Storage Technologies(Energy storage)

Basic and strategic applied research

ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY (Electrical and Electronic Engineering)
ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY (Mechanical, Aeronautical and Manufacturing Engineering)

Systems Analysis related to energy R&D (Other Systems Analysis)
Not Cross-cutting

Professor R Thring
Aeronautical and Automotive Engineering
Loughborough University

Standard

EPSRC

01 December 2011

31 May 2016

54 months

£3,012,029

Electrical engineering

East Midlands

User-Led Research

Professor R Thring, Aeronautical and Automotive Engineering, Loughborough University

Dr D J Auger, School of Engineering, Cranfield University
Professor NP Brandon, Earth Science and Engineering, Imperial College London
Professor KJ Burnham, Engineering and Computing, Coventry University
Dr D Howey, Engineering Science, University of Oxford
Dr T Larkowski, Engineering and Computing, Coventry University
Dr S Longo, School of Engineering, Cranfield University
Dr J Marco, School of Engineering, Cranfield University
Dr R Martinez-Botas, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Imperial College London
Dr M McCulloch, Engineering Science, University of Oxford
Dr GJ Offer, Earth Science and Engineering, Imperial College London
Dr DA Stone, Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University of Sheffield
Dr M Sumislawska, Engineering and Computing, Coventry University
Dr Q Zhong, Automatic Control and Systems Engineering, University of Sheffield

Project Contact, Cenex
Project Contact, AVL Powertrain UK Ltd
Project Contact, TUV Rheinland Mobility, Inc., USA
Project Contact, Jaguar Land Rover Limited
Project Contact, Intelligent Energy
Project Contact, SAIC Motor UK Technical Centre Ltd
Project Contact, AG Holding Ltd (trading as Axeon)
Project Contact, HORIBA MIRA Ltd
Project Contact, Dennis Eagle Ltd
Project Contact, Lotus Engineering

Hybrid electric vehicles (HEV) are far more complex than conventional vehicles. There are numerous challenges facing the engineer to optimise the design and choice of system components as well as their control systems. At the component level there is a need to obtain a better understanding of the basic science/physics of new subsystems together with issues of their interconnectivity and overall performance at the system level. The notion of purpose driven models requires models of differing levels of fidelity, e.g. control, diagnostics and prognostics. Whatever the objective of these models, they will differ from detailed models which will provide a greater insight and understanding at the component level. Thus there is a need to develop a systematic approach resulting in a set of guidelines and tools which will be of immense value to the design engineer in terms of best practice.The Fundamental Understanding of Technologies for Ultra Reduced Emission Vehicles (FUTURE) consortium will address the above need for developing tools and methodologies. A systematic and unified approach towards component level modelling will be developed, underpinned by a better understanding of the fundamental science of the essential components of a FUTURE hybrid electrical vehicle. The essential components will include both energy storage devices (fuel cells, batteries and ultra-capacitors) and energy conversion devices (electrical machine drives and power electronics). Detailed mathematical models will be validated against experimental data over their full range of operation, including the extreme limits of performance. Reduced order lumped parameter models are then to be derived and verified against these validated models, with the level of fidelity being defined by the purpose for which the model is to be employed.The work will be carried out via three inter-linked work packages, each having two sub-work packages. WP1 will address the detailed component modelling for the energy storage devices, WP2 will address the detailed component modelling for the energy conversion devices and WP3 will address reduced order modelling and control optimisation. The tasks will be carried out iteratively from initial component level models from WP1 and WP2 to WP3, subsequent reduced order models developed and verified against initial models, and banks of linear-time invariant models developed for piecewise control optimisation. Additionally, models of higher fidelity are to be obtained for the purpose of on-line diagnosis. The higher fidelity models will be able to capture the transient conditions which may contain information on the known failure modes. In addition to optimising the utility of healthy components in their normal operating ranges, to ensure maximum efficiency and reduced costs, further optimisation, particularly at the limits of performance where component stress applied in a controlled manner is considered to be potentially beneficial, the impact of ageing and degradation is to be assessed. Methodologies for prognostics developed in other industry sectors, e.g. aerospace, nuclear, will be reviewed for potential application and/or tailoring for purpose. Models for continuous component monitoring for the purpose of prognosis will differ from those for control and diagnosis, and it is envisaged that other non-parametric feature-based models and techniques for quantification of component life linked to particular use-case scenarios will be required to be derived. All members of the consortia have specific individual roles as well as cross-discipline roles and interconnected collaborative activities. The multi-disciplinary nature of the proposed team will ensure that the outputs and outcomes of this consortia working in close collaboration with an Industrial Advisory Committee will deliver research solutions to the HEV issues identified

30/01/12