Control of Complex Energy and Power Systems for Electrified Mobility

Abstract

Electrification of mobility and transport is a global megatrend that has been underway for decades. The mobility sector encompasses cars, trucks, busses, and aircraft. These systems exhibit complex interactions of multiple modes of power flow.  These modes can be thermal, fluid, electrical, or mechanical.  A key challenge in working across various modes of power flow is the widely varying time scales of the subsystems which makes centralized control efforts challenging.  This talk will present a particular distributed controller architecture for managing the flow of power based on on-line optimization.  A hierarchical approach allows for systems operating on different time scales to be coordinated in a controllable manner. It also allows for different dynamic decision-making tools to be used at different levels of the hierarchy based on the needs of the physical systems under control. Additional advantages include the modularity and scalability inherent in the hierarchy.  Additional modules can be added or removed without changing the basic approach.

In addition to the hierarchical control, a particularly useful graph-based approach will be introduced for the purpose of modeling the system interactions and performing early-stage design optimization. The graph approach, like the hierarchy, has the benefits of modularity and scalability along with being an efficient framework for representing systems of different time scales.  The graph allows design optimization tools to be implemented and optimize the physical system design for the purpose of control.  Recent results will be presented representing both generic interconnected complex systems as well as specific examples from the aerospace and automotive application domains.