Extended Comparative Analysis of Aircraft Energy Management Strategies for Improvements in Energy Expenditure, Hydrogen Savings, and Battery Lifecycle Assessment

Sustainable aviation requires electrical power systems that can deliver both high energy and high power. Hybrid fuel cell–battery architectures offer a promising solution to meet these demands, and their overall performance can be significantly enhanced through the application of energy management strategies (EMSs). This paper develops several EMSs approaches, including rule-based state machine, equivalent consumption minimisation strategy (ECMS), and dynamic programming (DP) for a hybrid fuel cell–battery aircraft targeting specific objectives, such as improving system efficiency, reducing hydrogen consumption and extending battery lifetime. The EMS approaches are then evaluated across both nominal missions and a fuel cell-failure scenario to assess their effectiveness in meeting their defined objectives. Results show that while ECMS achieves the lowest cost per mission, it does not maximise system efficiency. DP provides the highest overall energy efficiency and longest battery lifetime but is limited to offline implementation. To bridge this gap, a hybrid DP–ECMS strategy is introduced and evaluated. The results show that the approach delivers globally optimal performance under nominal conditions, accounting for the trade-offs between cost, efficiency, and battery ageing, while also preserving real-time responsiveness during unforeseen events. This demonstrates the benefits of combining offline optimisation with real-time control for hybrid electric aircraft. Software-in-the-loop (SIL) further validates the real-time applicability and robustness of the proposed strategy.