Energy Management for a Fuel Cell Plug-In Hybrid Heavy-Duty Vehicle

Decarbonizing heavy-duty road freight transportation requires efficient energy management in zero-emission powertrains. This study investigates energy management strategies (EMSs) for a heavy-duty Fuel Cell Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (FC-PHEV). Rather than the typical charge-sustaining operation, these strategies are designed for charge-depleting operation, in which each route begins with a charged battery and ends at a lower state of charge (SOC), leveraging the vehicle’s plug-in capability. The EMSs are evaluated primarily in terms of energy consumption, while battery C-rate and fuel cell ramp rate are used as simple stress indicators for comparative analysis. A backward-facing vehicle model is developed to test several EMSs, including both optimization- and rule-based strategies. The Equivalent Consumption Minimization Strategy (ECMS) emerged as a promising option, motivating further testing with a forward-facing model and additional drive cycles. The simulation results show that ECMS consumed only 1.1% more energy than the global optimal solution found by Pontryagin’s Minimum Principle (PMP) and 7.5% less energy than a simple rule-based strategy, on average across five drive cycles. These results show that ECMS can be effective for a heavy-duty FC-PHEV operating in charge-depleting mode, extending its demonstrated applicability beyond charge-sustaining and light-duty vehicles.