Energy Recuperation in Fully Electric Vehicles Subject to Stability and Drivability Requirements

Other conference contribution, 2012

This paper presents a combined control and estimation framework for energy recuperation in fully electric vehicles. We consider a fully electric powertrain, with a driven front axle operating on low friction road surfaces. Our objective is to find the blending of regenerative and friction braking that maximizes the amount of recovered energy (i.e., the regenerative braking), while (i) delivering the total braking force requested by the driver, (ii) preserving the yaw stability as well as driveability of the vehicle. The proposed framework, which consists of a predictive braking control algorithm and a vehicle state and parameters estimator, is appealing because it requires minimal re-design efforts in order to cope with different powertrain layouts (e.g., individual wheel motors) and/or control objective and design and physical constraints. We present simulation results, obtained in three sets of manoeuvres, showing promising results in terms of energy recuperation, vehicle stability and driveability.